Renaming a Windows Server 2008 R2 Domain Controller

Recently, I’ve been setting up a new lab and decided to rename my lab’s 2008R2 DC. I’d originally decided on a 13 letter name for my DC, and the naming convention is sound in a production hosting environment – first 3 letters for location, next 3 letters for company, next letter for platform (e.g. ‘m’ for Microsoft, ‘l’ for Linux, …), 3 letters for server role, next letter for whether it is virtual (v) or physical (p), and finally two digits – but with this being a lab, no thank you!

Fortunately renaming a Windows Server 2008 or 2008 R2 Domain Controller is easy to do, and here it is as a step-by-step walkthrough.

1^st step: Domain functional level must be at least Windows Server 2003

2^nd step: From the command prompt running as administrator, run the following command:

netdom computername OLD_DC_FQDN /add:NEW_DC_FQDN

Example:

C:\>hostname

LONACEMDMCV01

C:\>netdom computername lonacemdmcv01.ace.priv /add:ADMC1.ace.priv

Successfully added ADMC1.ace.priv as an alternate name for the computer.

The command completed successfully.

3^rd step: Wait a replication cycle for all DCs to sync the changes, and computer account updates and DNS registrations to complete

Note: In ADSI edit > DC=domain… > OU=Domain Controllers > CN=OLD_DC_HOSTNAME, the msDS-AdditionalDnsHostName attribute will show the change

Close ADSI Edit before we go onto 4.

4^th step: From the command prompt running as administrator, run the following command:

netdom computername OLD_DC_FQDN /makeprimary:NEW_DC_FQDN

Example:

C:\>netdom computername lonacemdmcv01.ace.priv /makeprimary:ADMC1.ace.priv

Successfully made ADMC1.ace.priv the primary name for the computer. The computer must be rebooted for this name change to take effect. Until then this computer may not be able to authenticate users and other computers, and may not be authenticated by other computers in the forest. The specified new name was removed from the list of alternate computer names. The primary computer name will be set to the specified new name after the reboot.

The command completed successfully.

5^th step: Reboot the DC

6^th step: From the command prompt running as administrator, run the following command:

netdom computername NEW_DC_FQDN /remove:OLD_DC_FQDN

Example:

C:\>netdom computername admc1.ace.priv /remove:lonacemdmcv01.ace.priv

Successfully removed lonacemdmcv01.ace.priv as an alternate name for the computer.

The command completed successfully.

THE END!

Note: If you re-open ADSI Edit after step 4 but before rebooting the DC in step 5, you will the see the following message “The connection Default naming context could not be loaded…” as below. Don’t worry, the reboot will fix it!

Sources

Daniel Petri - Rename Windows Server 2008 Domain Controllers

Stuart Coney - Rename a Windows 2008 Domain Controller