Problem installing Exchange Server. Please help.

[dave5317]

Hi,

I have a PDC (Computer A) on my home network running Windows 2000 Advanced Server with Active Directory configured. Then, I have another computer (Computer B)running Windows 2000 Advanced Server without promoting this machine as a Domain Controller. The main reason I installed W2K Adv Server on computer B is because I wanted to play with MS Exchange Server. Exchange Server only installs on Server products, and it is not recommended to install Exchange on the PDC. Computer B is able to log into the domain. However, when I try to install MS Exchange Server 2000 on computer B, I get this error message:

"The Component "Microsoft Exchange Messaging and Collaboration Services" cannot be assigned the action "Install" because:
-Setup is unable to access the Windows 2000 Active Directory
-Failed to contact the Schema Master Server for this Active Directory forest.

Anyone ever experience this problem before? Any feedback or advise will be apreciated. Thank you in advanced.

 

[N11]

It has been a while for me but I will try to help -- first you need to understand that your PDC/BDC architecture is gone, so when you say you have a PDC what you really have is a Windows 2000 domain controller which is also your global catalog server.

If you are actually authenticating through the domain with computer B and not just logging into the local machine then I would recommend you verify that you have given the appropriate security permissions to the user you are logged into computer B as. It has been my experience that administrator is not going to be enough, the user account needs a plethora of permissions and group memberships that I do not know off the top of my head.

Exchange isn't going to let you install it if it can't contact a domain controller and/or you are using a user who does not have the correct security permissions. But I do believe that when it is a permissions issue it isn't even going to give you the option to select install.

I'd recommend verifying that you are attaching to the domain controller with computer B, make sure that you have your AD forest and DNS correctly functioning on the domain controller (read through the event viewer), and verify your user has the appropriate permissions that exchange requires.

 

[dave5317]

Dear N11,

Thank you for the feedback. As you said, I was installing Exchange using the Administrator account. However, I remember my Exchange book discussed something about the Exchange Administrator rights. So I will try to log in as a Exchange Administrator and see if that's gonna make a difference.

As far as the AD is concerned, I am pretty sure it is correctly configured. The only thing I can think of right now, is the IP addressing. I have computer A and computer B hooked up behind a router. The router was configured to assign IP addressing to both computer. At a same time, I also configured computer A to assign IP addresses to clients. I did not check the IP address on computer B when I install Exchange. If computer B is getting the IP from the router, it is appropriate that computer B cannot find computer A with AD. Anyhow, i will try that tomorrow and make sure I have rights needed for installation, and make sure computer B is getting the IP from computer A. Wish me luck

 

[dave5317]

bump...