We have a Windows server 2012 R2 in our company network and it’s the only ActiveDirectory domain controller in the network.
Unfortunately, we made many mistake settings to the ActiveDirectory and wanted to revert them to previous ones from a backup I took a few days ago.
To do that, I needed to boot the domain controller in safe mode. So, I changed the boot setting in “msconfig” to boot it in safe mode, but it was a bad idea because in safe mode, the domain service stopped and there seemed to be no local account in the domain controller or, at least, I didn't know any of it to login.
Therefore, currently, there is no domain controller in the network and I cannot login even the domain controller and cannot make it boot in not safe mode but normal mode to login.
Do you know how to change the boot setting in msconfig without login or boot in normal mode in another way?
Thank you in advance.
Best Answer
Great to hear you managed to get the server working again. I really recommend resetting the Directory Services Recovery Mode (DSRM) password now that the server is alive, so you have it if something similar would ever happen again. Then store the password in a secure place or in a password manager you can reach even if the domain is unavailable.
To reset the DSRM password, run
ntdsutilon your domain controller, as an administrator. At the prompt, enterset dsrm password. Finally at the resulting prompt, enterreset password on server null. Set the password when prompted (the prompt shouldn’t echo your characters).(Source: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/322672/how-to-reset-the-directory-services-restore-mode-administrator-account)