Hello all, your help would be appreciated with the following problem. I am a novice with Windows Server 2003 and in an effort to learn more I have installed Server 2003 on an old PC (The PC complies with the min specs for 2003).

The basic installation went fine until I attempted to add Active Directory when I received the following message;

Active Directory installation operation failed; a general network error occurred.

Despite rerunning the AD installation wizard I cannot install AD. As a side issue I also cannot connect to the internet after attempting to install AD.

My first instinct was that there was a connection problem with either my ISP, router or network card. After checking the ISP/Router I attempted to reinstall the network card at wich point the internet connection returned.

I then attempted to reinstall AD and got the same result;

Active Directory installation operation failed; a general network error occurred.

I've now replaced the NIC but with the same result!

I've also checked the event log and found the following error at a corresponding time to each attempted AD install;

Error Event ID 7003
The Distributed File System service depends on the following nonexistent service: LanmanWorkstation.

This error seems to refer to the Client for Microsoft Networks but how it is relevant I don't know.

Any thoughts anybody?

if you were pointed to the isps dns server you can corrupt the AD install. MS DNS server needs to point to itself and forward to the isps dns.

What wanderer said.......and just to add to his point......it's better to let dcpromo install/setup DNS for you than to try to do it manually before running dcpromo. All you should have to do before running dcpromo is put the server's own IP address in the DNS setting in the TCP/IP settings for the server's NIC.

I get a error when installing my 2003 Server and this is exactly what it says..

"Active Directory Installing Wizard"

The opperation failed because....

Active Directory could not create the object CN=computername, CN=Partitions, CN=Configuration, DC=Supercorp, and DC=net.

Check the event log for possible system errors.

"The FSMO role owership could not be verified because its directory partition has replicated successfully with atleast one replication parter.