Hey,I am faced with an uncommon situation: I want to implement a pilot domain environment within a workgroup intranet. This intranet I am not allowed to disturb. Shall that be possible: to "dcpromo" a windows 2008 member server and leave him within the "old" workgroup at the same time?

hi there,Yes, you can safely convert the winodws 2008 member server into domain controller and configure the appropriate DNS server, DHCP server if required and necessary CA for any of the clients which requires certificate based authentication. Make sure you give static ip address to the windows 2008 and avoid multihome NIC on the DC which is not supported and also not recommended configuration.Configure appropriate software firewall ( windows 2008 has inbuilt firewall ) or you can rely on ISA server for more security for applications or any external access.and you can configure rest of windows 2003 / windows 2008 member servers joined either to domain or leave them as workgroup under the same subnet. hope this info helpssainath Windows Driver Development

Hello Zisch, If I understand your question correctly, Once you dcpromo the w2k8 server it effectively becomes a domain controller and member of a domain and will not be a workgroup member any longer..Your other option might be to add other clients to the domain and still maintain your intranet.. I am assuming that the w2k8 server is not a member of an existing domain but it is in a non domain workgroup Isaac Oben MCITP:EA, MCSE

Thank you Isaac,thats exactly what I wanted to know!Zisch