DNS errors causing active directory to crash

[rakem]

We have been having some DNS issues on a few of our servers which i believe are causing Active Directory to crash. When trying to access active directory user and computers, domains and trusts, we sometimes get the erroe "the server is not operational" Usually a reboot fixes the problem but this is not always the easy to do as we have clients accessing the servers 24 hours a day.

Upon examination of the DNS logs there are numerous errors such as:

Event ID 4015:

The DNS server has encountered a critical error from the Active Directory. Check that the Active Directory is functioning properly. The extended error debug information (which may be empty) is "". The event data contains the error.

Event ID 9999

The DNS server has encountered numerous run-time events. To determine the initial cause of these run-time events, examine the DNS server event log entries that preceded these run-time events. The data is the number of events that have been suppressed in the last 60 minute interval.

Event ID 404

The DNS server could not bind a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) socket to address 0.0.0.0. The event data is the error code. An IP address of 0.0.0.0 can indicate a valid "any address" configuration in which all configured IP addresses on the computer are available for use.

Restart the DNS server or reboot the computer.

EVent ID 408

The DNS server could not open socket for address 0.0.0.0.

Verify that this is a valid IP address for the server computer. If it is NOT valid use the Interfaces dialog under Server Properties in the DNS Manager to remove it from the list of IP interfaces. Then stop and restart the DNS server. (If this was the only IP interface on this machine and the DNS server may not have started as a result of this error. In that case remove the DNS\Parmeters\ ListenAddress value in the services section of the registry and restart.)

If this is a valid IP address for this machine, make sure that no other application (e.g. another DNS server) is running that would attempt to use the DNS port.

There are hundreds of these errors all through the error log, Our DNS has seemed to work well for quite a long time, there have been no major changes to the system that would be causing these errors.

All servers are windows 2003

any one got any suggestions?

[cluberti]

It appears as though your DNS server is having trouble binding to an IP address on port 53 - have you considered manually configuring your DNS server to use a specific IP address?

Also, are these multihomed machines, and do you use any NIC teaming software?

[tguy]

Open the registry and locate TCP/IP, Parameters, then locate any adapter that has an address of 0.0.0.0 and delete the registry key.

Of course before deleting any keys, backup the key by exporting it to a file. Reboot the server and see if the problem goes away.

You should be using a static IP address on your DNS server and have that address configured before you install DNS. If that is not the case, uninstall DNS, reboot, assign a static IP address, and re-install DNS.

Hope this helps.

[rakem]

It appears as though your DNS server is having trouble binding to an IP address on port 53 - have you considered manually configuring your DNS server to use a specific IP address?

Also, are these multihomed machines, and do you use any NIC teaming software?

Our DNS server does have a specific static IP address, the machines are not multihomed, but we do use teaming software on most of our servers. The ones in question either use an Intel Gigabit dual port or 2 intel gigabit cards, and we have them teamed in a static link aggregation mode.

[rakem]

Open the registry and locate TCP/IP, Parameters, then locate any adapter that has an address of 0.0.0.0 and delete the registry key.

I have found some registry keys under the HKLM\System\Current Control set\Control\Services\TCPIP\parameters\Interfaces that have IP address and subnet mask as 0.0.0.0

Also there are some keys called IPAutoConfigurationAddress that have 0.0.0.0 listed as well, any ideas on which ones i should get rid off?

[cluberti]

I would think you could delete them all, although the autoconfiguration entries shouldn't be affecting this.