scampbell's questions

I added a new domain recently to our AD. It was added using the option to add a new domain to an existing forest.

So now we have the original domain.local which is in the forest also called domain.local. We have added the domain newdom.local to the domain.local forest.

Everything was working fine until I went on holiday for a few weeks and the new DC in the newdom.local domain was turned off (luckily there are no active users in that domain yet). When I realised it had been turned off, I turned it back on but could not access through RDP so troubleshooting began. There are various issues but the main issue I think is DNS seems to be broken, which stops replication occurring.

When running commands like dcdiag /test:dns from the new DC, it cant find itself. It is looking at 31d2ecb5-550c-4111-9f8e-faa78d93eda7._msdcs.domain.local which is a CNAME entry that points towards the DC, but the FQDN in that DNS entry shows as dc-01.newdom.local,domain.local. which cant be resolved (I assume because the forest is in there after the comma). I can however resolve dc-01.newdom.local. no problem.

DNS is replicating this extra ,domain.local for most CNAME and SRV entries causing the new server to not be found.

Is this normal for a new domain in an existing forest to have the DNS FQDN include the forest name? If so, how do I fix DNS to allow resolution of these FQDNs? Alternatively how do I stop them being added?

Thanks for any help.

I am experiencing a strange problem with my Exchange 2010 server. The virtual disk holding all Exchange databases on the Exchange server is acting like it is corrupted. If I run chkdsk E: /F is says the file system is RAW, but when I take down the server and mount the disk in another 2008 VM, I can run CHKDSK with no errors at all.

I am going to try update the database locations in Exchange to point to a UNC path of the other server to at least get things moving again but obviously this is not a permanent fix.

Any ideas?

Saturday night, 1 week into my 2 week holiday. Typical.

Thanks.

I am currently running Exchange 2010 on a server which is hugely underutilised so am hoping to virtualize Exchange and other servers on this machine.

What is the best way to move/convert Exchange?

I will require this machine to be reinstalled with Server 2008 R2 server core to run only Hyper-V.

I thought of backing up (to multiple locations, just in case!!), reinstalling the server with core + Hyper-V, then restoring the backup to a new VM.

Or should I use the Sysinternals Disk2vhd tool first. Convert to VHD, then reinstall server with core and add the VHD as a new VM?

The Exchange databases and logs are on a separate RAID 5 array which would be left untouched so would making this disk available to the Exchange VM would allow it to continue where it left off after the server was restored from backup to the new VM?

I also read it is not recommended to use P2V tools with Exchange, but since I am required to reinstall the machine what choice do I have? In that case should I install Exchange on another server, move all databases and users to that server, reinstall old server, install Exchange VM, then move all databases and users onto the new VM?

The more I think about this, the more my head spins, so any insight is appreciated.

Thanks.

Im having a problem where I get the error 'An error occurred while obtaining an IP address from the DHCP server. Please check to ensure that there is an operational DHCP server on this network segment' when booting from a standard WDS boot.wim image taken from a Windows 7 DVD.

I am using Server 2008 R2 and am adding the drivers to the boot using WDS, but also have the problem if the drivers are injected beforehand using DISM.

When the error occurs I can shift + F10 and IPCONFIG and see it HAS picked up an internal IP from DHCP. Seems maybe it is timing out before it gets the IP? DHCP server is not on the WDS box but is in the same subnet.

As per some fixes I have read I enabled RSTP on my switches but that didnt help.

I have included the end of setupact.log to see if any of you have any ideas. Seems to be failing but as I say, the network IS initialized as I can see the internal IP assigned by DHCP when running IPCONFIG.

I dont suppose theres any way of increasing the timeout?

Thanks.

2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info       [0x0b0022] WDS    StartNetworking: Trying to start networking.
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service dhcp not running or could not be queried: 264d00 1 1
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service lmhosts not running or could not be queried: 264e18 1 1
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service lanmanworkstation not running or could not be queried: 264d00 1 1
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service bfe not running or could not be queried: 264e18 1 1
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service ikeext not running or could not be queried: 264d00 1 1
2011-04-11 17:26:31, Info                  WDS    Network service mpssvc not running or could not be queried: 264e18 1 1
2011-04-11 17:27:24, Info                  WDS    Installing device pci\ven_14e4&dev_1691&subsys_04aa1028 X:\WINDOWS\INF\oem37.inf succeeded
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    No computer name specified, generating a random name.
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Renaming computer to MININT-VN2P876.
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Acquired profiling mutex
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Service winmgmt disable: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Service winmgmt stop: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Service winmgmt enable: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Released profiling mutex
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Acquired profiling mutex
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Install MS_MSCLIENT: 0x0004a020
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Install MS_NETBIOS: 0x0004a020
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Install MS_SMB: 0x0004a020
2011-04-11 17:27:25, Info                  WDS    Install MS_TCPIP6: 0x0004a020
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Install MS_TCPIP: 0x0004a020
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Service dhcp start: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Service lmhosts start: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Service ikeext start: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Service mpssvc start: 0x00000000
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Released profiling mutex
2011-04-11 17:27:26, Info                  WDS    Spent 967ms installing network components
2011-04-11 17:27:28, Info                  WDS    Spent 2247ms installing network drivers
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Info                  WDS    QueryAdapterStatus: no operational adapters found.
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Info                  WDS    Spent 10140ms confirming network initialization; status 0x80004005
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Info                  WDS    WaitForNetworkToInitialize failed; ignoring error
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Info                  WDS    GetNetworkingInfo: WpeNetworkStatus returned [0x0]. Flags set:   
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Error      [0x0b003f] WDS    StartNetworking: Failed to start networking. Error code [0x800704C6].[gle=0x000000cb]
2011-04-11 17:27:38, Info       [0x0640ae] IBSLIB PublishMessage: Publishing message [WdsClient: An error occurred while obtaining an IP address from the DHCP server. Please check to ensure that there is an operational DHCP server on this network segment.]

I have unsuccessfully tried to increase per user incoming mail size settings by editing their user account settings on our Exchange server, but large incoming mail from external domains is still blocked using the default global settings.

After reading here: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;322679

I see that

All Internet e-mail messages use the global setting for limits on sending and on receiving. The message categorizer evaluates the sender's sending limit and the recipient's receiving limit. In example 2 earlier, a user with a user mailbox limit of 3 MB could receive messages from another user with a 3-MB sending limit. Because Internet users use the global setting, they can send only a 2-MB message.

Which to me is madness! Surely if I want to allow a user to receive mail up to a certain size then I should be able to set it as such?

Is there a specific way of getting round this? Would setting the global defaults high and setting a lower, say 10MB, limit on the SMTP connector do the trick?

Thanks.

Im using a PERC 3/DC controller to run a RAID 5 array using 4 hard disks. I am hoping to change this to 3 disks in the array and 1 hot spare. Is it possible to remove 1 disk from the array, reconfigure it as a hot spare, then reconfigure the RAID 5 array to use 3 disks WITHOUT loosing any data? I have backups but I would rather just reconfigure it without going through the hassle of restoring data. Thanks!