Single DC unable to see itself as the PDC - Warning: DcGetDcName(PDC_REQUIRED) call failed, error 1355 A Primary Domain Controller could not be located.

Sammy Cat 1 Reputation point
2021-11-03T23:01:36.953+00:00

Over the past year or so, one of our clients directories has been having some serious Active Directory Synchronisation issues. In the current state, the Active Directory Domain Controller cannot view itself as the PDC, even though the _msdcs Forward Lookup Zone is configured correctly and all FSMO roles have been seized.

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : BETDC02
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . : mydomain.local
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : mydomain.local

Ethernet adapter Ethernet0:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : mydomain.local
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : vmxnet3 Ethernet Adapter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-0C-29-3B-68-3B
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::497b:407d:faea:fc2a%13(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.20.51(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.20.1
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 100666409
DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . . : 00-01-00-01-25-36-71-1E-00-0C-29-3B-68-3B
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : ::1
192.168.20.51
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

This is a virtual machine hosted in VMWare, when trying to promote another domain controller to this domain I get an error in the Server Manager wizard informing me that a Domain Controller cannot be found in this domain.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I am at my wits end here.

Active Directory
Active Directory
A set of directory-based technologies included in Windows Server.
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  1. Dave Patrick 425.7K Reputation points MVP
    2021-11-04T00:18:42.49+00:00

    Also add the server's own static ip address (192.168.20.51) plus loopback (127.0.0.1) listed for DNS then do ipconfig /flushdns, ipconfig /registerdns, restart the netlogon service.
    If no joy then please run;

    Dcdiag /v /c /d /e /s:%computername% >C:\dcdiag.log
    repadmin /showrepl >C:\repl.txt
    ipconfig /all > C:\dc1.txt
    ipconfig /all > C:\dc2.txt
    ipconfig /all > C:\dc3.txt

    then put unzipped text files up on OneDrive and share a link.


  2. Dave Patrick 425.7K Reputation points MVP
    2021-11-04T02:57:21.14+00:00
    • The Remote Procedure Call (RpcSs) service should be set to auto start.
    • Odd that there's a system event log message complains that this DC has a dynamic IPv6 address which if true would be problematic.
    • Have you rebooted it recently?
    • Does it get the domain network profile?
    • computer time is correct?

    Also check the time service configuration is correct. For PDCe

    w32tm /unregister
    net stop w32time
    w32tm /register
    net start w32time
    w32tm /config /manualpeerlist:<ntp ip address> /syncfromflags:manual /reliable:yes /update
    net stop w32time
    net start w32time
    then check
    w32tm /query /source
    w32tm /query /configuration

    https://tf.nist.gov/tf-cgi/servers.cgi


  3. Dave Patrick 425.7K Reputation points MVP
    2021-11-04T12:50:14.697+00:00

    I'm not sure why it's showing that in the Sys event log, it must be an older event

    It was in the last 60 minutes prior to dcdiag

    The computer time is correct

    still wouldn't hurt to check
    w32tm /query /source
    w32tm /query /configuration