In this video from ITFreeTraining I will look at upgrading a Windows Server 2012 Domain
Controller to Windows Server 2012 R2. Windows Server 2012 R2 is an incremental upgrade to
Windows Server 2012 offering additional features rather than making too many changes to the
core operating system.
Before you install your first Windows Server 2012 R2 Domain Controller you first need to
meet some requirements. First of all, your domain must contain only Windows Server 2003
or above Domain Controllers. If you have a Domain Controller that is lower than 2003,
you will need to upgrade it before you install your first Windows Server 2012 R2 Domain Controller.
Next you need to run ADPrep /ForestPrep once in the forest before you install the first
Windows Server 2012 R2 Domain Controller. This makes a number of schema changes required
by Windows Server 2012 R2. These changes can be made at any time before the deployment
of the first Windows Server 2012 R2 Domain Controller and does not affect the running
of the current domain. You could for example run ADPrep months or years before you installed
your first Windows Server 2012 R2 Domain Controller.
The next step is you need to run ADPrep /DomainPrep once in each domain in the forest. Although
this needs to be run in each domain at some stage, you only need to run it in a domain
that you plan to install a Windows Server 2012 R2 domain controllers in. If you have
a domain that you are not planning to add any 2012 R2 Domain Controllers to, you do
not need to run the command until you decide to deploy your first Windows Server 2012 R2
Domain Controller.
The last point to remember is this does not affect Windows Server 2012 R2 member servers.
If you want to try out Windows Server 2012 R2 and are not ready to deploy any Windows
Server 2012 R2 Domain Controllers, you can always install a Windows Server 2012 R2 server
and add it to the domain. If you do this, there is no requirement to run these commands
before you add it to the domain.
I will now change to my Windows Server 2012 Domain Controller and look at upgrading it
to Windows Server 2012 R2.
In this demonstration I will upgrade the Domain Controller NYDC1 from Windows Server 2012
to Windows Server 2012 R2. In a production environment, I would personally not do it
this way. I would personally run the ADPrep commands and then install Window Server 2012
R2 Domain Controller on a brand new server rather than upgrading an existing server as
it is less prone to problems doing it this way. However, in the real world this is not
always possible and you may need to perform an upgrade like the one that I am about to
perform.
Just like if you were upgrading a client operating system, the operating system that you want
to upgrade from needs to be booted into before you run the setup. In this case, NYDC1 is
already running and I am logged in.
I have put the setup DVD in the computer, so all I need to do is open the DVD and run
the setup. The setup will then start up and I will get the option install now to start
the upgrade process.
The first screen of the wizard asks if you want to go online and obtain the latest updates
before starting the update process. It is recommended to select the top option “Go
online to install updates now” in order to ensure the latest updates are installed
at install time. You can always install the updates after the upgrade, however, it is
possible due to a software problem that setup may crash. By installing the updates, this
means that the latest updates will be installed reducing the chance that there will be a problem
with the upgrade and that is why I also recommend to download these updates before the upgrade.
Once the upgrades have been downloaded and installed the setup will continue. How long
this takes depends on the speed of your internet connection. On the next screen you will need
to enter in your product key. Once this has been entered on the next screen you need to
select if you want to install the core interface or the full GUI interface. In this case I
will select the Full GUI interface and move on.
On the next screen I need to accept the license agreement and move on.
The next screen you need to determine if you want to perform an upgrade or a custom install.
If you select a custom install this will install a fresh install of Windows. I want to perform
an upgrade so I will select the top option “Upgrade Install Windows and keep files,
settings and applications”.
The setup will now perform a compatibility check to see if it can detect any problems.
This will check the hardware and Microsoft software, however additional vendor applications
are not checked and the administrator will need to perform their own checks to ensure
that these applications will work with Windows Server 2012 R2.
The compatibility report will be saved to the desktop if you want to read it later on.
If I scroll down, notice that there is an error message at the bottom. Before the install
can be started, the command ADPrep needs to be run as indicated.
To do this, I will exit the setup and then once back at the desktop, I will press the
Windows Key followed by the X key to bring up the quick access menu and from this menu
I will select the option for the command prompt.
From the command prompt I need to change to the directory on the DVD called support and
in this directory the folder called ADPrep. The next step is to run the command ADPrep
/ForestPrep
Once the command runs, it will remind you that the lowest Domain Controller supported
is Windows Server 2003. Before you run this command, make sure that you do not have any
Domain Controllers that run Windows Server 2000.
To start upgrading the schema, press c and then press enter. Once the process starts,
it is not reversible so this extra step has been added to ensure that you are aware of
what is happening before you run the command and commit to the changes to be made.
The process of upgrading the schema does not take too long to complete. The older your
schema the longer it will take but the process is generally quite fast.
The next command that I will run is ADPrep /DomainPrep. Notice this command did not take
very long at all to complete. Once again, if you are upgrading from an older domain,
for example you are running Windows Server 2003, this process will take longer. Since
I am already running Windows Server 2012 not many changes need to be made.
Since I have made schema and domain changes, before I start the upgrade I want to replicate
these changes to the other domain controllers. To do this, I will run the command RepAdmin
with the parameters /SyncAll and /APeD. Note the last parameter is case sensitive and the
e is lower case. This command with these parameters will force a sync from this Domain Controller
to all other Domain Controllers on the network.
The speed of your network will determine how long this process will
take. It is a good idea to wait for this to finish before starting the upgrade. If you
are planning to perform an upgrade to Window Server 2012 R2, ADPrep can be run any time
before the upgrade. For example, it is not uncommon in large companies for an Enterprise
Administrator to run these commands possibly months in advance and another administrator
at a later time perform the upgrade of the Domain Controller.
Now that the changes have been replicated, I will exit out of the command prompt and
run the setup again. Since I have already gone through this already, I will quickly
select the same options that I did previously and keep going through the install until I
get the installation type screen.
On this screen, I will once again select the option “Upgrade Install Windows and keep
files, settings and applications” and move on.
Like the last time the compatibility report will be run and saved to the desktop. This
time when I look at the results, there is no error messages displayed that will prevent
the install from running.
Once I press next the upgrade will start. The process does take a long time to complete.
On this computer it took just over half an hour to complete so I will pause the video
and return when it is complete.
Once the computer has started up I will login. At first there does not appear to be too many
changes except for the name change at the bottom of the screen from Windows Server 2012
to Windows Server 2012 R2.
Once logged in the desktop looks much the same as Windows Server 2012. Server Manager
looks the same. Once I close server manager, notice that at the bottom left hand corner
there is now a start menu icon. When I press this button it will bring up the new start
menu just like in Windows Server 2012. However, notice that if I go back to the desktop, if
I now right click the start icon I get the quick launch menu. This is a great feature,
as before you could only access this menu by pressing the Windows key followed by the
X key, however when using remote control tools these shortcuts sometimes do not work.
Lastly, notice that when I move the mouse cursor to the top right of the screen, charms
opened just like before.
Well I hope you have enjoyed this video on upgrading to Windows Server 2012 R2 and have
found it helpful. In later videos I will be looking at the new features in Windows Server
2012 R2 so I hope to see you in these videos from us - All free on our web site or YouTube
Channel. Thanks for watching and see you next time.