Deploying 2008 R2 DC for remote office

phoeneous

I'm deploying a dc running x64 2008 R2 Standard for a remote office. I'm configuring it at our main office where our main 2003 gc sits. Should I add the 2008 dc to the domain from the main office or wait until I take it to the remote office and join it from there? Or does it really make a difference?

MrAgent

If you can stage it locally where you have a ton of bandwidth, then I would do it locally. If you have limited bandwidth to your remote office you could be waiting a long time waiting for replication to finish.

phoeneous

I think I'm just going to do it from the remote office to avoid any issues having an 03 and 08 dc on the same subnet. Our schema is small enough and the p2p link is big enough to handle the replication.

RTmarc

Having a 2003, 2008, and 2008 R2 domain controller on the same subnet makes no difference. Just make sure you complete the required domain prep commands before adding the new domain controllers.

MrAgent

He wouldnt be able to add the 2008 server to the domain if he didnt run adprep. Just in case the commands are below.

Note that you need to copy the Adprep folder (location depends on if 2008 or 2008 R2) to the various role holders and run them from there.

If youre using R2, then you would run the adprep32.exe if your role holders are 32bit boxes.

ADPREP /forestprep on the Schema Master
ADPREP /rodcprep on the Domain Naming Master
ADPREP /domainprep on the Infrastructure Master

phoeneous

I ran adprep earlier today, went well with no errors.