post domain rename/exchange rename hiccup

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YeOldeStonecat

[H]F Junkie
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After renaming active directory, and its Exchange server (On an SBS box)...appeared to go well. Basically a rename from "nameofmydomain.com" to "nameofmydomain.local"

Today I removed the DNS zones for the "nameofmydomain.com".

Now..when opening Outlook after a fresh reboot.....you see in the lower right corner...it's looking for the old server name at .com...instead of .local. Tried wiping the outlook profile..adding it new..typing in the new servers FQDN....but it still flips back to .com when resolving the name. Eventually opens after about 3 minutes. Not a showstopper..just a performance nag.

Where to poke around next.... :confused:
 
Verify in DNS that the old domain is gone and flushed. Your clients will need to flush DNS as well

ipconfig /flushdns

This should fix it.
I asusme they can ping the server by its new name?
 
Not sure if you tried this...........

MSExchange.org

Scroll down to where they talk about XDR fixup:

"Running the XDR-fixup tool is an additional step required for doing a domain rename operation. XDR-fixup modifies Exchange Active Directory attributes to reflect the new domain name."
 
shade_star said:
Verify in DNS that the old domain is gone and flushed. Your clients will need to flush DNS as well

ipconfig /flushdns

This should fix it.
I asusme they can ping the server by its new name?
Click to expand...

Yeah..after deleting the old .com zone on the DC..and ensuring it was gone on the old DC....flushed the cache on both DCs..and even restarted the DNS service.

I noticed the issue yesterday...after I removed the .com zone...I unbuckled a brand new Thinkpad out of the box...joined the domain, installed Orifice 'n the usual crap...went to configure the new user..and Outlook hung right there. Brand new box..so no stale DNS to flush.
 
SJConsultant said:
Not sure if you tried this...........

MSExchange.org

Scroll down to where they talk about XDR fixup:

"Running the XDR-fixup tool is an additional step required for doing a domain rename operation. XDR-fixup modifies Exchange Active Directory attributes to reflect the new domain name."
Click to expand...

Yup..ran that, along with the rendom steps....
Similar to this proceedure...
http://thelazyadmin.com/blogs/thelazyadmin/archive/2006/06/07/Domain-Rename-Part-1-_2D00_-Setup.aspx
http://thelazyadmin.com/blogs/thela.../08/Domain-Rename-Part-2-_2D00_-Renaming.aspx
http://thelazyadmin.com/blogs/thela...omain-Rename-Part-3-_2D00_-Exchange-2003.aspx

My hunch is that there is still something "stale" left inside of Exchange itself....clinging onto the old hospice.com domain name. The Exchange server boxes name is "hosp-sbs".

Even in Outlook....when I setup a new profile...usually you just type in the Exchange servers netbios name....such as "hosp-sbs"..and then the first few letters of a users username...click on check name..and it comes back resolved with the full server name. It keeps coming back with the old name....hosp-sbs.hospice.com. Instead of the new one...hosp-sbs.newnameIgavethem.local. Even if I type in the full new name of the server..once you click on check name..it comes back with the old.

Reason I did the domain rename..well, original consultant that set them up a while ago made their AD hospice.com. Hospice is just a generic term...there's a kajillion hospices out there...and sure enough, one of them owns that domain name. So since I was shoving SBS into my client..with e-mail, figured I'd tackle the domain rename. I should have done the domain rename before introducing SBS...but..I didn't, I initially thought that doing a domain rename..and then going through the steps of introducing SBS and transferring the roles over to SBS...might end up being flakey. Hindsight though.... *sigh*
 
Check DNS there has to be an A record with the old name or an srv record. Check DNS just to make sure there's nothing in there referencing the old name
 
shade_star said:
Check DNS there has to be an A record with the old name or an srv record. Check DNS just to make sure there's nothing in there referencing the old name
Click to expand...

Clean as a whistle...I built the newdomainname.local and _msdcs.newdomainname.local forward lookup zones as part of the domain name change. Let it run for approx 3 weeks..and just yesterday deleted the 2x old hospice.com zones.

Thinking a bandaid fix just to get rid of this delay is to recreate the hospice.com zones and manually make a record just for the hosp-sbs server. But I feel this is some leftover thing sitting inside of Exchange.
 
Exchange never plays nice after a rename thats why its best to leave alone or wipe.
Did you use the adutil to rename?
 
Is this outlook 2007 w/ its autodetection? I had a friend who ran into a similar issue with a domain rename a month or two ago.
 
Definitely some unchanged info languishing about in the Exchange portion of the AD schema. You might try connecting to the Exchange portion of the schema using ldp.exe (Preferably the 2003 R2 version, it has a lot more power) and run a few queries to see if you can find the entries and correct them by hand with ADSI edit.

The following support article contains some ominous text in regards to your endeavor:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/842116/en-us

"To use the domain rename operation, Exchange Server must not be installed on any domain controllers. If a domain controller is running Exchange Server, you must move the Exchange data from the domain controller, and then remove Exchange Server."
 
shade_star said:
Exchange never plays nice after a rename thats why its best to leave alone or wipe.
Did you use the adutil to rename?
Click to expand...

Yeah..up until now I've always done a fresh new domain, and just manually migrated clients to the new one. But I usually deal with just smaller networks..this one was, compared to my usual, larger, want to say around 60x clients total and 3 existing servers...in reading about the newish features and tools for 2K3...seemed it would go smoother. I found mixed messages warning about doing this when Exchange is sitting on a DC (which..since this is SBS..it is)...nothing definitive though...so maybe that causes some little leftover thing deep inside of Exchange.

Created that hospice.com forward lookup zone in DNS yesterday afternoom...creating a name for the hosp-sbs server. Soon as that was done...went into terminal server..created another Outlook profile...BAM...zippity quick resolution again. So the "bandaid fix" of recreating that old DNS entry worked. May just have to live with that...but would love to find the cause of this...and make it squeeky clean.


Created that hospice.com forward lookup zone in DNS yesterday afternoom...creating a name for the hosp-sbs server. Soon as that was done...went into terminal server..created another Outlook profile...BAM...zippity quick resolution again. So the "bandaid fix" of recreating that old DNS entry worked. May just have to live with that...but would love to find the cause of this...and make it squeeky clean.

The steps I did were basically what's outlined in those 3x lazyadmin links up above..very quick reads.
 
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