Have a small business network that was installed by a 3rd party. Company has 4 desktops and a file server and system was set-up using numerous domains. Original installer no longer available. Domain usage for this system seems way to much of an overkill and confusing. I need to know if I can set-up a group member in additional to the domains and simplify everything or do I have to start from scratch using a group. No security is needed between computers and users, simple want a network where each computer is available in a network neighborhood type system without all the policies and rights and security issues that domains require. If anyone has a source for literature for basic set-up and installation it would be appreciated.

Hello,if you like to remove the domain and use only a workgroup environment with a file server where all users safe/share the data, this is of course possible. Unfortunal you have to demote the DC and at that moment all domain user accounts are gone and you have to create local users on any machine. They must be all in the same workgroup as the server and ther server need all user accounts/passwords configured so the workstation users are abole to access the server.Best regards Meinolf Weber Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Hi Steve, Thanks for posting here. I understand that you would like to know whether you can migrate the current domain environment to workgroup for a small business environment. Yes, as mentioned by Meinolf, it is possible to migrate the current domain environment to workgroup. However, I have to say that the whole migration task is a little complex and time consuming. Besides creating new local users and demoting the domain controller, you will also need to perform the following tasks: 1. User profile migration. After creating new local user profiles, users need to migrate their settings in the domain user profile to local user profile. 2. File/folder permission. If some files or folders are granted permission to AD users, you will need to reconfigure the permissions to grant to local users. If you really want to migrate to workgroup, here is the rough steps for your reference: 1. Create new local user accounts on these 4 desktops. 2. User profile migration. 3. If some files / folders are granted permission to AD users, you need to reconfigure the permission to the new local user account. 4. Change 4 desktop computers to Workgroup. 5. Demote your DC to Workgroup via start -> Run Dcpromo. 6. Create the relative users name on the fileservers local users group. 7. Grant the proper permissions to the shared folders for these desktop users. 8. Map the shared folders network drive to the desktop. For more information about How To Share Files and Folders Over a Network for Workgroups, please refer to: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/301281 Wilson Jia - MSFT