Taking Advantage of Replication Improvements


Windows Server 2003 allows an Active Directory Architect more freedom in the placement of domain controllers across the enterprise. This is because Windows Server 2003 has improved the behavior of replication. At the most basic level, Windows Server 2003 has changed the model for replication. Windows 2000 Active Directory replicated changes object by object. Windows 2003 Active Directory takes this concept one step further by replicating changes attribute by attribute. The net result is an overall reduction in replication traffic.

Benefits of Multi-Master Replication

One of the biggest differences between Active Directory and NT 4.0 is the introduction of multi-master domain controllers. This is to say that domain controllers all contain read/write copies of the account data. In NT 4.0, only the Primary domain controller was able to write to the SAM database. This meant that all Backup Domain Controllers had to get their SAM updates directly from the PDC. This hub and spoke replication resulted in large amounts of traffic, much of which had multiple conversations going across the same WAN connection. In Windows 2000 and 2003 Active Directory, domain controllers are able to determine their own replication topology and create meshed replication paths to make replication as efficient as possible. Rather then have all DCs in a site talk to the same DC for replication, a bridgehead server can replicate with a remote server and then replicate the same information locally among other domain controllers in the same site. This results in a significant decrease in domain controller replication traffic.



Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Insider Solutions
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Insider Solutions
ISBN: 0672326094
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 325

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