From: John Beckett 

Richard B.  wrote in message
news::
> Let's say I set it up as a new domain, I could have have it on the
> same physical network and migrate users to it on my own sweet time
> without conflicts?

Say your existing NT4 domain is ACME and you plan to call your new W2003
domain acme.win (or acme.com or whatever). I think you would have to NOT
have the new domain controller on the same network as any ACME computers
while you were using dcpromo to promote the new computer to act as a domain
controller. I would not be surprised if the new machine refused to make a
duplicate "downlevel" domain name.

However, I am pretty confident that you could set up the new acme.win
domain while not plugged into your normal network (you would have to plug
it into a hub of some kind so the NIC was functioning during the dcpromo).
Then later you could run the two domains on the same network with no
problem.

Your biggest problem with making a new domain is that each user will end up
with a new profile when given a new account on the new domain. You would
have to experiment with how you could work around that hassle (like find
out how to copy the old profile to the new profile).

Making a completely new domain is probably the best way to go. The best
feature is that you don't have to commit to it until you have done a few
days testing. You don't destroy anything, and can redo the whole procedure
a couple of times until you get it right!

John

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