Installing Windows 2008 R2 Active Directory Domain Services - Part 4 (Read Only Domain Controllers)

In this video, I show how to install a Read-Only Domain Controller (RODC), and I discuss some of the advantages to using an RODC.

Tools used in this video:

1. DCPromo – This command-line tool is used to add/remove Active Directory Domain Services on a specified Windows Server

How to Activate a Windows Product License Key on Windows 2008 R2 Server Core

In a previous demonstration I promised to show how to activate your Windows Product License Key on a Windows Server Core machine.  I forgot to do that, so I’ve created this brief video to do so.

Essentially, you do everything through a Visual Basic Script called the Windows Software Licensing Management Tool (slmgr.vbs).

For a complete description of the available switches when working with slmgr.vbs, you can check out the following TechNet article:

Slmgr.vbs Options

Sorry about neglecting this in the previous video.  Hopefully now everyone is caught up.

Until next time…

Installing Windows 2008 R2 Active Directory Domain Services - Part 3 (Server Core)

In this demo, I show how to use an unattend.txt file to promote a Windows 2008 Server Core machine to be a domain controller.

Tools used in this video:

1. DCPromo – This command-line tool is used to add/remove Active Directory Domain Services on a specified Windows Server

Reference Material Used in Creating this Blog:

• Dcpromo
• How to use unattended mode to install and remove Active Directory Domain Services on Windows Server 2008-based domain controllers

In the final part of this series I’ll show how to configure a DC as a Read-Only Domain Controller (RODC).
Until then…

Windows 2008 Server Core–Initial Configuration

In this video, I show the basic steps necessary to set up a Windows Server Core machine so that it can communicate on the network and join an Active Directory domain.

In this video, I show how to use NETSH and NETDOM to configure TCP/IP settings, rename the computer and join an existing domain.

Tools used in this video:

1. NETSH – This is a multi-purpose command-line tool that is useful for performing many different tasks within a Windows Server environment.  In the present video, I show how to use this tool to configure TCP/IP and DNS settings on a selected network interface.
2. NETDOM – This tool allows the administrator to work with Active Directory domains as well as trust relationships from the command line.

Reference Material Used in Creating this Blog:

• Configuring a Server Core Installation: Overview
• How to Use the Netsh.exe Tool and Command-Line Switches
• Netdom

Installing Windows 2008 R2 Active Directory Domain Services - Part 2

In this demonstration, I show how to add a second domain controller to an existing forest.  Additionally, I demonstrate how to work through a particular problem related to DNS that the 2nd DC encounters when trying to find the AD DS domain.

Tools used in this video:

1. DCPromo – This command-line tool is used to add/remove Active Directory Domain Services on a specified Windows Server

In the third part of this series, I’ll show you how to install AD DS onto a Windows Server running Windows Server Core.  Until then…

Installing Windows 2008 R2 Active Directory Domain Services - Part 1

In this video, I explain how to use the built-in graphical tools on your Windows 2008 R2 Server to install a new Active Directory forest.  In this video, I demonstrate the use of the DCPROMO tool to perform a local install of AD DS.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

The tools we use in this video are:

1. DCPromo - this command line tool is used to install ("promote") or uninstall ("demote) Domain Controllers (DC) into an Active Directory Directory Services (AD DS) forest.  It can be used to create a new forest, create a new domain within a forest, and/or add DCs to an existing domain or forest.

Next time I’ll show how to add a 2nd DC to an existing forest via the GUI.  Until then…