Recommendations for changing from Workgroup to Domain?

[Velvis]

I have a new client with 18 PCs, 2 Macs, and a Windows Server 2008 box. The server is really only being used as a file server.

It has been decided to set the office up as a domain and it would like to be done with as little downtime as possible and as seemless as possible for the user.

Currently all users are admins, which I am going to change to standard accounts as well.

What the best way to transfer the user data and settings from the local account to the new domain account? Is there a tool for this?

Does anyone have any heads up on things to look out for on something like this?

Also the company email and webpage is not hosted locally, is there any issue naming the office domain the same as the company url domain?

 

[FremontPC]

Somebody will be along that knows servers better than I do, but in the meantime:

What kind of hardware and how are the drives set up? Are they running through a RAID controller?

Have you checked the drives to make sure they're ready for action? Is there a utility to check the health of the drives and access the SMART report? If not, then HD Sentinel will give you the health status on individual drives that are in an array and will show you the SMART report for each drive.

Does each workstation have an Admin account that you can get into if you're going to be switching everybody over to Standard accounts?

Is everybody on gigabit nics? Switches all gigabit for the workstations at least?

Have a look at this post, if you're going to be sticking with '08:

https://www.technibble.com/forums/t...to-new-domain-user-profile.40292/#post-314956

and this, wrt domain name:

http://www.mdmarra.com/2012/11/why-you-shouldnt-use-local-in-your.html

 

[CompConfig]

Server 2012 essentials well transfer over the user when you use the connector to join. Other wise you can copy profiles. Check each computer for files saved locally. Make sure the server has enough storage to handle the folder redirect.

 

[seedubya]

If you need to copy profiles use Profwiz

 

[SAFCasper]

+1 for Profwiz. Have used it multiple times.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Since it's an old 2008 box...I'd look into things more.
*How old is this server? Does the client want to spend $ on your time for this? (likely...over 2500 probably over 3000 bucks). If the server is over 4 or 5 years old...and especially if it has desktop drives in it (SATA)..instead of proper enterprise drives, and if it's just 8 gigs or less RAM....I'd be hesitating on this. Not really good ROI, IMO.
Is this Server 08 (Vista Server) or Server 08 R2 (Win7 Server)

Since you're asking this question...and you mention client wants no downtime...are you familiar with how to change TCP/IP properly on the server, setup/configure DNS, run DCPROMO...setup DHCP on the server (thus removing it from the router).
And then securing control of the local Administrator passwords on the workstation (you want that local backdoor account)
Oh..and inventory the workstations first....make sure they are all "Pro" versions of Windows. Nothing sucks more than doing onsite to do this, an finding at least several rigs are Win7 Homeless edition.
Tuneup of workstations, free from malware
Run Microsoft updates on all of them
Setup printers on the server, print server role, publish printers to clients (GPO)

When you join a workstation to a domain, and you log in as domain admin and/or the domain user, a virgin fresh "bare" profile is created.
I usually just manually copy what I want out of the old profile...I cherry pick only the data I want. Either do it locally from the workstation, or I do it via UNC paths from the server. I just snag the important stuff...Documents, Desktop, Favorites...pretty much sums it up. Outlook folders are easy too..but I work with Exchange users majority of the time so I don't run into the time consuming POP/IMAP residential stuff. There are profile movers, like linked above, but...I've often noticed/found...often peoples old profiles have "junk" you don't want in them, could be malware, could be corrupt/dead registry settings, glitches, quirks. Starting them over fresh 'n clean is preferred by me. yeah, one or two will moan about losing their desktop wallpaper...no big deal, takes them what..30 seconds to find that pic and set it up again?

 

[thecomputerguy]

+1 ProfWiz

What I would do is do a manual local backup on every single workstations user profile data to the root C: (The first one will be hopefully be finished by the time you start the backup on the last one).

Then knowing the data is in tact setup group policy for Folder Redirection, and make sure you also setup GP to disable offline files. I've had terrible luck with offline files enabled, and even worse luck with offline files enabled while connecting a computer to a domain using ProfWiz.

Make sure the user data size matches on the server when you do folder redirection, sometimes not all of it gets pushed to the server and it takes multiple reboots for the GP for offline files to take effect as it is a computer policy and not a user policy.

Just did this exact process at a dental office with 8 workstations while installing a new server and converting from Workgroup to Domain.

Here are a couple of sources I use nearly every time I install a server....

https://4sysops.com/archives/folder-redirection-part-1-introduction/

http://www.petenetlive.com/KB/Article/0000779

Just make sure the server you sell them has enough space to accommodate the porn and music of 18 workstations.

Also I redirect:

Desktop
Start Menu
Favorites
Documents
Pictures (Follow Documents)
Music (Follow Documents)
Videos (Follow Documents)

This is also very important @YeOldeStonecat

Since you're asking this question...and you mention client wants no downtime...are you familiar with how to change TCP/IP properly on the server, setup/configure DNS, run DCPROMO...setup DHCP on the server (thus removing it from the router).
And then securing control of the local Administrator passwords on the workstation (you want that local backdoor account)
Oh..and inventory the workstations first....make sure they are all "Pro" versions of Windows. Nothing sucks more than doing onsite to do this, an finding at least several rigs are Win7 Homeless edition.
Tuneup of workstations, free from malware
Run Microsoft updates on all of them
Setup printers on the server, print server role, publish printers to clients (GPO)

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I urge caution on music redirection....
Typically music 'n pics are "personal", not business related. One or two users sync'ing their iTunes....can bloat a server, and bloat backup, and that rolling snowball causes issues and expense.

 

[FremontPC]

I think Velvis has left the building...

 

[BlazonTech]

With regards to the domain name, don't ever make them the same for website domain and internal domain!
One of the linked articles in a reply gave very good best practices for naming domain (do a subdomain of your website domain).

The issue you will get is with DNS on the local network. The clients will have issues accessing the external domain unless you setup a separate DNS record. Even then if the web designer decided to go something with the website DNS without informing you, you are in again for another round of fun troubleshooting which I just did this week.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I just do .local for whatever their public domain is.
So if the OPs business has a website/email domain of "velvis.com"....I'll set AD for "velvis.local".