I manage a small-ish network that consists of less than 70 nodes. The previous system administrators opted to have a dhcp server and manually set dhcp addess.
I have opted to rather use dhcp address assignment instead of static address assignment except for my domain controllers and EXS hosts. I have been critised for following this scheme, but its way easy for me to manage the address scope with out having to scan the network for available ip addresses. Am i on the right track or have i lost the plot?
Best Answer
Why were you criticised for doing it that way? I mean I think it's crazy not to use DHCP for workstations at least, but maybe there is something specific to the environment that changes that equation.
The only issue I can see with DHCP is ensuring that your scope is properly created and doesn't cross over with the pool of static addresses you use (even that can be got around with reservations but its more work than needed).
That aside, users should never ever need to know whether or not you use DHCP because their workstation should 'just work', except for when the DHCP server is not available (and if that's an issue, you just have more than one DHCP server online).
EDIT: Convict makes a good point about documentation, make sure you do have the IP address ranges documented, explaining what you've done, why and how to find it. I don't think people are comfortable with the idea that some tools are "self documenting" (and to an extent they might have a point, how would you easily re-create your DHCP database with all your reservations, if you couldn't restore from backup?).