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I work in an environment where the amount of paperwork I have to do to stand up a single server in boundless. That being said I'm standing up two new 2012 R2 Domain Controllers. One is to be a virtual and one is to be a physical machine (we have a bunch of physical windows servers on the network and require beyond five 9's.)

What I'm trying to figure out is if I need to do a full blown install on the physical server (takes forever here), or if I can use the clone DC function and do a V2P to the new physical machine.

What I'm wanting to know is if anyone has done this and if there is anything I need to be concerned with or if there is any reason I shouldn't do this?

HopelessN00b
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Nxahoward
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1 Answers1

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I surely would not recommend it, even if domain controllers are clonable now (yippie!), for the same reason you generally see a lot fewer utilities, options and support around V2P than you do around P2V: drivers. And related to that, the fact that a V2P generally will be at least as much effort as just installing new.

In your scenario, to do a V2P, at a minimum, you would need to:

  1. Go through the Domain Controller clone procedure.
  2. Use an expensive tool to actually to do the V2P.
  3. Go into DSRM to ensure the validity of your Active Directory, and restore [part of] the domain controller again.

I have trouble imagining how that would be either quicker, or easier, than just installing your OS on a physical media and promoting it to a domain controller. (And I'd probably have lingering questions/concerns about whatever third party tool not properly handling the V2P because it's a domain controller, but I don't know how valid those are, TBH.)

My advice: Just do it the manual way. Yeah, it'll take longer, but that's why you'd want to kick off the install and get through the manual portion and then go to lunch or go home for the day, or do something else, so it doesn't matter that the computer is performing the time-intensive automated functions of actually installing the OS, because you're not waiting on it anyway.

HopelessN00b
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