Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Move Central Administration to another server in your farm

  1. On the existing farm Central Administration server (DEV01W2K3) remove the Central Administration website:
    1. Run the SP configuration wizard
    2. Select: Do not disconnect from the server farm (Warning: Disconnecting from the server farm will result in all your web applications being deleted from IIS. They can be recreated if you reconfigure central administration again and link to the existing configuration DB, but they will be unavailable until that time. That means no web sites available and more down time than necessary!)
    3. Select: Yes, I want to remove the website from this machine
    4. Select: Ok

    Note: The configuration wizard will stop IIS and all websites may become unavailable for a few minutes while it steps through the processes. Ensure that you do not delete any databases as you will be hooking the new Central Admin site to the original DB.

    If you check IIS you will see that the Central Administration web application has disappeared leaving only your portal web apps and the OfficeServerApplication



  2. Run the SP configuration wizard on the new server (DEV02W2K3) and recreate the Central Administration site.
    1. Select: Do not disconnect from the configuration database
    2. Select: Advanced Settings
    3. Select: Use this machine to host the web site
    4. Select: Next / Ok
  3. Open central administration and check the servers in the farm – you should see Central Administration now hosted on DEV02W2K3:



  4. Check all your services are running – search may need restarting and you may need to reset the index role in the Shared Service Provider properties.
  5. Check your event logs and work through any issues.

6 comments:

  1. Top post. I used this to move Central Admin with no problems. Thanks.
    Steve

    ReplyDelete
  2. I accidentally removed the database via the Central Admin utility. When I attempt to re-add it via stsadm addcontentdb, I get access denied no matter what account I use. I ultimately need to move it to SQL 2005 (currently on SQL Express). What are my options? Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I removed the database associated with Central Admin (using the Central Admin tool/view). I ultimately want to move it over to SQL 2005 (currently on SQL Express). Even when I attempt to readd (stsadmn addcontentdb) back to SQL Express, I get Access Denied no matter the accounts (including the site admin account). What are my options? Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What if I want to keep Central Admin. on the same server but move the virtual directory from the C: drive to the D: drive?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Open Central Administration on the existing server -> Operations -> Servers on Server, choose custom role and start Central Administration on the new server.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great, thank you !! Followed these simple steps and everything went well

    ReplyDelete