DHCP disaster recovery

Hi, I am testing DHCP restore to a spare, un-networked server runing 2003. It
is a DC and has the same name and IP of the DHCP server so it can be slotted
into the domain if the original has a problem. The DHCP service on it is
authorised and I have Administrator and DHCP Admin permissions. Restore shows
no errors but does not fill in scopes and leases. I am looking to find out
what I am not doing and/or if this is a feasible scenario. For disaster
recovery like this, would the best thing be to have a spare AD DC in the
domain with DHCP service installed but not active, and do a restore to this
when necessary. Looking forward to your input, thanks.

In Windows Server 2003 you can use netsh command to export and import the
DHCP database. See:

http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;325473

Keeping a duplicate server offline in case of online server failure can be a
cool solution. However, if the offline server is a DC, it cannot have the
same name as an online DC. In fact, if you have successfully installed
Active Directory on an offline server with the same name as an online DC,
you must necessarily have created a new forest even though the domain name
is the same as the online Active Directory domain.

If you want to keep a replacement DC offline, it has to be created online
with a unique computer name; then you bring it back online about once per
week or so allow replication to take place.

Doug Sherman
MCSE Win2k/NT4.0, MCSA, MCP+I, MVP

"Stephen ISU" <Stephen (E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:99301E21-3CCF-4E13-AAE1-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi, I am testing DHCP restore to a spare, un-networked server runing 2003.
It
> is a DC and has the same name and IP of the DHCP server so it can be
slotted
> into the domain if the original has a problem. The DHCP service on it is
> authorised and I have Administrator and DHCP Admin permissions. Restore
shows
> no errors but does not fill in scopes and leases. I am looking to find out
> what I am not doing and/or if this is a feasible scenario. For disaster
> recovery like this, would the best thing be to have a spare AD DC in the
> domain with DHCP service installed but not active, and do a restore to
this
> when necessary. Looking forward to your input, thanks.

Doug, thanks for your assistance. I should have mentioned (ahem..) the dhcp
service is on a cluster. Export works on a local system only. I gave dump a
quick try and it appered to run to completion but I wqs not asked for a file
name and could find no default text file created. I will look into this
further, but if you or anyone else have thoughts on, or experience of this,
please let me know. Thanks. Stephen

"Stephen ISU" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:5CBD5A1C-F3EC-4D8F-9C5D-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Doug, thanks for your assistance. I should have mentioned (ahem..) the
dhcp
> service is on a cluster. Export works on a local system only. I gave dump
a
> quick try and it appered to run to completion but I wqs not asked for a
file
> name and could find no default text file created. I will look into this
> further, but if you or anyone else have thoughts on, or experience of
this,
> please let me know. Thanks. Stephen

Why do you even need to do so? DHCP will build its own database up "fresh"
extremely quickly. The only thing you need to do yourself are the
Reservations,...and if you use a lot of those then you need to rethink your
design,...Reservations should be kept minimal. If there is a lot, then
those machines should just be statically assigned and forget it, and not use
DHCP.

--

Phillip Windell [MCP, MVP, CCNA]
www.wandtv.com