How to manually delete a DFS Namespace using ADSIEdit

Information:

This procedure assumes all DC’s that hosted this DFS Namespace are no longer available and will not be restored.  Use this procedure with caution, follow good practices by taking system state backups prior to deleting anything from Active Directory.

1)      Open AdsiEdit

a.       Connect to the Default Naming Context of the Domain

b.      Right click the ADSI Edit and select Connect To

                                                               i.     

c.       Fill in the appropriate connection settings as shown below.

                                                               i.     

d.      Click OK

2)      Drill down to the following container

CN=Dfs-Configurat,CN=System,DC=domain,DC=net

a.       Delete the affected DFS Namespace(s) listed on the right.

                                                               i.      Example, deleting the apps DFS Namespace.

                                                             ii.     

3)      Force Replication

4)      On each DC stop and restart the DFS Namespace service.

a.       Command Line

net stop dfs

net start dfs

b.      Services MMC

                                                               i.      Select the DFS Namespace service and click Restart.

                                                             ii.     

5)      Restart the DFS service on the client computer.

6)      Run the DFS Management Console

a.       Remove any existing DFS Namespaces from the display.

b.      Restart the DFS Management Console

c.       Add DFS Namespaces to display.

                                                               i.      This list should not display the removed DFS Namespaces.

7)      You can now manually recreate the DFS Namespace

a.       To simplify creating the DFS Namespace you should export the DFS Namespace configuration on a regular basis so you can import it as needed.