WINS and Domain Renaming

If you are renaming a domain on a TCP/IP network, you must keep in mind during the renaming process that all the domain members, including the Backup Domain Controllers (BDCs), need to find the Primary Domain Controller (PDC) to log on to the domain. Windows Internet Naming Service (WINS) maintains, among other information, the name of the Domain Master Browser, which is the domain's PDC. The WINS database represents this entry with a special <1BH> (1B in Hex, or 27 in decimal) designation. Because the Domain Master Browser entry is specific to the domain's NetBIOS name, your newly renamed PDC will automatically register a new <1BH> entry when it reregisters with the WINS server after restarting. After you verify via WINS Manager that this registration has occurred, you need to manually trigger replication between the PDC's primary WINS server and any other WINS servers on the network. Doing so ensures that all WINS servers register the <1BH> entry for the renamed domain's PDC. If you use LMHOSTS files (or, perhaps, a central LMHOSTS file) rather than WINS for name resolution, you need to manually add a new <1BH> entry for the PDC. (For more information about this procedure, see the Microsoft article "How to Statically Initialize WINS with 0x1B for the PDC" at http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q129/2/18.asp.)