We have a small business that one of our required applications needs to run on a server and their recommended product is Server 2008 R2 There are only 8 machines in the network including the 2008 r2, linksys router and linksys switch (5 workstations) Internet connectivity is currently run thru the linksys router with DHCP enabled for a wireless subnet that does not connect to the server in any way. The 5 current network clients are all static IP's 192.168.2.X So effectively I have: Comcast Internet Router w/ public ip 68.xxx.xxx.12 Subnet 255.255.255.254 Dns 68.xx.xx.xxx Linksys Wan side pointing to Comcast Lan side 192.168.2.1 subnet 255.255.255.0 Dns 192.168.2.1 68.xx.xx.xxx 68.xx.xx.xxx Clients are 192.168.2.x subnet 255.255.255.0 Dns 192.168.2.1 68.xx.xx.xxx 68.xx.xx.xxx Switch for the 5 clients at 192.168.2.x current Domain Controller server is 192.168.2.4-This is a Windows 2003 SBS server running over a Win2k server. no DHCP but with DNS running.AD is running This AD DC is way over configured for the business needs. Frankly the company that configured it treated it as if we were Fort Knox with some very convoluted (and often conflicting) Group Policies. I need to simplify this. What I need is: a Domain Authentication server to handle the 5 users (this is really driven by the application). This server will also host a single MS-SQL Database. The server and 5 workstations running static NAT ip's pointing to 192.168.2.1 (Linksys) which connects us to the internet, but only under the domain admin profile, not the users profiles. My questions are: Do I need to run this as an AD? do I need to Run Sysprep/ForestPrep/ADprep since this is the only server and there are only 5 clients? If not how do I install to avoid all of those requirements? do i need to run the DNS role? Everything is static, they don't change unless the ISP changes our IP's or nameservers, so the load and maintenance seems to be overkill. The application requires both domain credentials and an application specific login (don't ask that is just the what the app requires), but nothing on the server actually connects to the internet unless I need to run an application update, which I can download and run locally. Since I don't need the DHCP server on the R2 and there will never be a need for a dhcp client on the work network will the DHCP running in a wireless subnet interfere with the R2? The client workstations only connect to the server under their Network login names, those user profiles are restricted to local work i.e. they can't get to the internet (basically dumb terminals), if they need to get to the internet they hook in to the wireless from laptops. Only the domain admin profile can log in and get to the internet from the client workstations. any help, guidance or opinions would be great. I cannot see the need to over configure this small network and if was not for the application requirments I would not even install the R2.

Hello, if i understand you correct you like to built a new network/domain with a Windows server 2008 R2 and some workstations, all connected to the switch and over the router to the internet. You don't like to use anything from the old Windows 2003 SBS domain and prefer to built all again from scratch to get rid of the previous for you overloaded configuration. For the new setup using only one server is not the best option, but with a small company you maybe have no other option. Normally you should use a DC not for anything else, especially applications like SQL or other ones that require user access to a DC. Recommended are 2DC/DNS/GC for the domain and a member server for application/file/print services etc. I can not really understand the applciation requirement you describe. A SQL server has it's own account and the domain users, ok. But what does the application account should be, is that app web-based, then this could be the case. DNS is a MUST to run a domain. DHCP depends on your needs, can be the router, whereas i prefer the Windows server for it as this has more configuration options. So before going on give a statement to my thoughts and then we can talk about the needed setup.Best regards Meinolf Weber Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights.