Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 10-5
Removing domain services
Removing a Domain
There are two ways to remove a domain, depending on how you
removed DCs: Dcpromo and Ntdsutil. If you used Dcpromo to remove the last DC, you're fin-
ished with domain removal because Dcpromo handles removing all vestiges of the domain from
the rest of the forest.
However, if the last DC crashed or was simply taken offline without using Dcpromo to demote
it to a regular server, you must use Ntdsutil to remove the domain. This process is called removing
an orphaned domain. The following steps explain how to remove an orphaned domain with
Ntdsutil. The procedure is called metadata cleanup, which removes all selected domain data from
the rest of the forest, and you must be a member of Enterprise Admins to perform this procedure:
1. Log on to a domain controller.
2. Open a command prompt window and run Ntdsutil. Ntdsutil is an interactive command-
line program, like Nslookup.
3. Type
metadata cleanup
and press
Enter
to display the Metadata Cleanup prompt.
4. Type
connections
and press
Enter
.
5. Type
connect to server
DCName
and press
Enter
, replacing
DCName
with the name of the
domain naming master DC. (To determine which DC performs this role, open Active
Directory Domains and Trusts, right-click the Active Directory Domains and Trusts node,
and click Operations Master.) Type
quit
and press
Enter
.
6. At the Metadata Cleanup prompt, type
select operation target
and press
Enter
.
7. Type
list domains
and press
Enter
. A list of domains is displayed.
8. Type
select domain
n
, replacing
n
with the number in the list for the domain to be removed,
and press
Enter
.
9. Type
quit
and press
Enter
to get back to the Metadata Cleanup prompt.
10. Type
remove selected domain
and press
Enter
. You should get a message indicating that
removal was successful.
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