Any point in installing high available RODCs?

Question

Hi,

We know RODC is "special" kind of domain controller, but is there any reason to install highly available RODCs? How to do it- clusters/nlb? Any deployment tips/tricks/gotchas?

Thank you!

Answer 1

Active Directory doesn't support clustering, nor NLB. However, NLB is accomplished by simply adding just another DC in same site. If one DC is down, another available DC is used. That is, you want to provide a highly-available DC (full or read-only), then just add another DC in same site.

Answer 2

We do not need to worry about the high availability of DC, because AD's multi master replication has taken into account high availability.
Refer to the following connection:

1. Features of the Replication Model for Active Directory Domain Services
   https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/ad/features-of-the-replication-model-for-active-directory-domain-services
2. Why Active Directory Domain Services Uses This Replication Model
   https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/ad/why-active-directory-domain-services-uses-this-replication-model
   “Active Directory Domain Services are a free-form system for the following reasons:
   Customers require a highly distributed solution in which parts of the directory can be spread across their networks and administered locally.
   Large customers often grow to millions of objects, hundreds or thousands of replicas, or both.
   Many customer networks provide only intermittent connectivity to some locations; for example, remote oil drilling platforms and ships at sea, so the system must be tolerant of partly connected or disconnected operations.”
   https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/ad/features-of-the-replication-model-for-active-directory-domain-services