Boris, Adding a second domain controller to an Active Directory environment is a recommended best practice. Information within Active Directory will replicate between the two controllers and it will provide fault tolerance in the event a single controller fails. It is not a substitute for a backup of the AD environment, which should be created and tested to address failure of all your controllers, or data corruption.
When you add the second domain controller, it will not take the PDC emulator role which was assigned to the first DC during your domain upgrade or creation phase. If the first domain controller fails, the second controller will take over most operations of the Active Directory environment, but you should be aware of your FSMO roles, what they are, what DC they are assigned to, and how to gracefully and forcefully migrate them if needed. This is also important if you have an Exchange server in your environment. Windows 2000 Active Directory FSMO roles http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q197132/ How to view and transfer FSMO roles in Windows Server 2003 http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;324801 FSMO placement and optimization on Active Directory domain controllers http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;223346 Microsoft's Active Directory Site http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/directory/active directory/default.mspx I haven't used Samba in production enough to comment on your other question. Hopefully some of the information above is helpful. Thanks. Keith Duemling - end - -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Boris Demirov Sent: Monday, September 05, 2005 4:00 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: [ActiveDir] Additional domain controller Hello everybody, I have two questions: In a network with one domain controller (windows 2003) I want to add an additional domain controller (windows 2003) in order to replicate everything on the primary DC. Is this possible and a good idea? Can two domain controllers work parallel and replicate each other (something like a cluster)? After adding additional domain controller will it take the role of the primary if the primary fails? I am more into linux so the windows server concepts are not very clear to me. And something else: I have a samba on a linux server which reads user permissions from the domain controller with winbind. Is there a way I can migrate the samba files on the additional domain controller including permissions? I`ll appreciate every answer. Thank in advance. List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ Disclaimer: This message, including attachments, is confidential and may be privileged. If you are not an intended recipient, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail, then delete and destroy the original message and all copies. You should not copy, forward and/or disclose this message, in whole or in part, without permission of the sender. List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
