dns.cache Best Practices

[SB]

Greetings all,

Our DNS servers have been recently configured to forward external lookups to
our ISPs. The Root Hints tabs have been emptied on all DNS servers and
dns.cache have been renamed so the servers wouldn't automatically populate
the Root Hints tab. Our DNS is Active Directory Integrated.

When our DNS servers start, they list two events 1000 and 1004, as we've
renamed dns.cache and the server can't find the file. According to the
internal help, if a server is a root DNS server for an organization its Root
Hints tab should be empty.

If all internal DNS servers in the organization are also DCs, and they are
hosting the same root zone, are they are all considered to be the root for
the zone? What is considered the Best Practice regarding the contents of the
Root Hints tabs?

TIA,

- S

[Ace Fekay [MCT]]

"SB" <S...@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:64D1AA82-8390-473A...@microsoft.com...

I would just leave the Root hints in the list. Besides, if you have two
Forwarders listed, the timeout will be reached before it may ever get to the
Root hints anyway.

See if this helps to repopulate a Windows 2000 DNS. It should also work for
2003 and newer. Actually with 2003 and 2008, you click the Copy button and
specify an external DNS (such as 4.2.2.2) to populate the Root hints.

Replacing root hints with the Cache.dns fileYou may experience one or more
of the following symptoms:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/249868

More info on EventID 1004 and 1000:
http://eventid.net/display.asp?eventid=1004&eventno=4010&source=DNS&phase=1
http://eventid.net/display.asp?eventid=1000&eventno=1832&source=DNS&phase=1

--
Ace

This posting is provided "AS-IS" with no warranties or guarantees and
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Please reply back to the newsgroup or forum for collaboration benefit among
responding engineers, and to help others benefit from your resolution.

Ace Fekay, MCT, MCITP EA, MCTS Windows 2008 & Exchange 2007, MCSE & MCSA
2003/2000, MCSA Messaging 2003
Microsoft Certified Trainer

For urgent issues, please contact Microsoft PSS directly. Please check
http://support.microsoft.com for regional support phone numbers.

[J de Boyne Pollard]

S> If all internal DNS servers in the organization are also DCs,
S> and they are hosting the same root zone, are they are all
S> considered to be the root for the zone?  

You do realize that that has nothing to do with _your_ situation,
don't you? In your situation, _as you described it_, your DNS servers
_do not have_ a "." zone.

S> What is considered the Best Practice regarding the contents of the
S> Root Hints tabs?

Best practice depends from what one wants to do. What you want,
apparently, is a forwarding-only proxy DNS server.

<URL:http://homepage.ntlworld.com./jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/dns-
monolithic-server-as-proxy.html#Microsoft>

As can be seen, you don't touch the root hints at all in order to
achieve that. So put your root hints back, and select the
configuration options given in the FGA.