Root domain controller and network connectivity

During installation for Windows Server 2003 Std, do you have to specify that
Server 2003 should be joining a domain for network connectivity to work? I
don't have a domain. This installation of Server 2003 would be my root domain
controller. Do I still have to specify the root domain as the domain for
Server 2003 to join during installation for network connectivity to work?

My problem is that I did not specify a domain during installation and now
there's no network connectivity.

Thanks.

 

Hello JJ,

During the 2003 first install you don't have to. The machine will be installed
with the server operating system and after that you can install the thinigs
you like. A domain will be created when you run dcpromo from the run line
and then it will ask you for the domainname etc.

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers
no rights.

 

Then why don't I have network connectivity? Here's my setup:

1. Windows Vista 64-bit on the bare metal.
2. Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 64-bit on top of Vista
3. Windows Server 2003 Std on top of a Virtual Server VM.

I have a virtual network configured in Virtual Server with my active NIC
that has an Internet connection assigned to that virtual network. And that
virtual network is assigned to the Server 2003 VM.

I just don't have network connectivity.

What am I doing wrong?

Thx.

 

Hello JJ,

Please post an ipconfig /all from the VM and from the vista machine.

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers
no rights.

 

Hi:

I can't find a way to copy the output of ipconfig/all from the VM to the
host's clipboard. How can I do this?

Thanks.

 

You really need to think about what you are doing here before you get
yourself into trouble. Setting up a domain is not a trivial thing to do and
can have unexpected results for the unwary.

For a start, forget about Internet connectivity for your domain
controller now. In fact I would recommend that you put it on the internal
virtual network which has no Internet connection. Give your server a static
IP in its own private IP subnet.

Now run dcpromo. Select the option to create a new DC in a new domain
and new forest. Let dcpromo set up DNS and DHCP when it offers you the
option. If you want to check out how AD works, install a client OS in
another vm also connected to the internal network.

Giving a domain Internet access involves two things. Firstly you need a
routed connection to the Internet. Secondly, you need to modify the local
DNS server to forward to a public DNS.

 

Bill:

All I want to do at this stage is complete the installation of Server 2003
by using it's Windows Update feature. For that, I need a connection to the
Internet.

I'm not sure I want to make this a fully operational domain controller. This
is something like trial software. I only want to use this as a development
server. I have SBS 2003 which I will use for my live site.

Now, I have another problem. I installed the Microsoft Loopback Adapter as
you suggested in your posting on the Virtual Server 2005 newsgroup. And I
enabled ICS on the host like you said. Now, the loopback adapter has limited
connectivity. How do I assign the shared ICS connection to the loopback
adapter? And should the loopback adapter get a new IP address automatically
or should it have a static IP address?

Thanks.

 

If you have connected the vm to the loopback network it should get its
config automatically from ICS.

Having said that, a server OS is not a good ICS client. You could try to
manually configure the vm with a 192.168.0.x IP, 255.255.255.0 subnet mask
and set 192.168.0.1 for the gateway and DNS address.

 

Hi Bill:

Before we get to the VM, the loopback adapter has to be configured
correctly, right? As of now, it has limited connectivity.

How do I assign the shared ICS connection to the loopback adapter?

Thanks.

 

If you installed ICS with the loopback adapter selected as the private
interface, it should now be configured with an IP of 192.168.0.1/24. (This
config is done by ICS). It won't have connectivity with anything except a vm
which has its NIC set to use the loopback virtual network.

 

I thought I was doing it wrong because I had enabled ICS before installing
the loopback adapter. So, I disabled ICS and uninstalled the loopback
adapter. And then I rebooted and installed the loopback adapter followed by
enabling ICS.

I'm still facing the same problem. The loopback adapter has limited
connectivity. How do I fix this.

Thanks.

 

What do you see if you look at the network config of the loopback adapter
on the host? Does it have an IP of 192.168.0.1?

Have you put the NIC of the vm into the loopback adapter virtual network? If
so, what happens if you do an ipconfig /release followed by ipconfig /renew
from a command prompt on the guest?

 

I got kind of frustrated and formatted my hard drive and reinstalled Vista.
And then I installed the loopback adapter followed by enabling ICS.

Now the loopback adapter has the IP Address 192.168.0.1. However, it's DNS
server address is blank. And it has limited connectivity.

Can I assign 192.168.0.1 for the DNS server as you had said earlier?

Thx.