Server dropped from AD. How to add back in?

[Gino Castoldi_2]

Hi,

Server: W2K3 SP1
DC: W2K3 SP1 AD/DNS

We have a W2K3 server that was part of an AD domain. Somehow it was dropped and now I need to add it back in. Does anyone know how to do this?

10 points to any good answer
Thank you
Gino

[Ivan Ferreira · Accepted solution]

You should verify if the computer account is still on AD Users and computers. If exists, try the "reset computer account" option.

You could also de-promote the server, and then run the dcpromo to add it again to the domain. You should ensure that this server is playing any operations master role.

Finally, if you have a backup of the system state data, you can authoritatively restore the object for that domain controller using ntdsutil.

[Jonathan Axford]

An easy way to do it would be to just delete any computer account that still references it in AD users and Computers and re-join it to the domain.

You may have to put the server in a workgroup, restart it, then join the domain and restart again but that should work fine.

I gather from your message that the server in question is NOT a Domain Controller, So there shouldn't be any problems,