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Server 2012 R2 w/ GUI in Hyper-V role, hosting VM servers. Very small system at present.

Primary Servers in this system are: Domain Controller(DC), SQL, TFS, IIS, Build server

I successfully installed my second DC on a new physical Hyper-V host. I was able to see the Enable Recycle change made on the new DC reflected on the old DC, so I presume everything is going well. I also intend to shift the PDCe functions to this new DC on the physical server.

At present I have just the one physical server that hosts (or will host) most of my servers as listed above. Prior to getting this machine, I had successfully hosted all of my servers in a Win 8.1 workstation (It's a pretty big workstation). Until I get another machine, my temporary plan was to keep the old DC operating as a vm Server running on the Win 8.1 workstation that is still acting as a Hyper-V host. In that manner I have 2 DC's, each on a different machine. But the workstation hosting the original DC won't be on 24/7, so that DC will be 'off the domain' for temporary periods.

So my questions are, how long can my DC server hosted on the workstation be 'off the domain' before I would experience problems, and what would those problems be?

Of course, if anyone thinks this is a really terrible solution, feel free to advise what problems I might expect. But if it is a reasonable temporary solution until I am able to procure another physical machine, then I'd like to stay with it.

Alan
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  • Maybe this could answer your question : http://serverfault.com/questions/579231/whats-the-downtime-limit-of-a-domain-controller-dc – krisFR May 15 '15 at 16:18
  • I didn't see that question in my search, thanks! So technically, unless I change it, 180 days is the limit. I would never even approach that limit b/c I work on the system M-F, so effectively the 2nd DC on the workstation will be on the domain pretty regularly. While you answered my main question, what problems do we experience if a DC is off the domain past the limit? – Alan May 15 '15 at 16:56
  • Past the limit, no way to authenticate clients/services against AD. From there, you are the only one able to measure the impact regarding how you use AD services within your network. – krisFR May 15 '15 at 18:08
  • So do you just kill that DC permanently and create another one? They're not that hard to spin up, right? – Alan May 15 '15 at 23:17

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