Dissecting questions and answers for the Windows 2000 Server exam can make you a more confident—and successful—test taker.

A Little Q&A

Dissecting questions and answers for the Windows 2000 Server exam can make you a more confident—and successful—test taker.

• By James Carrion
• 08/01/2001

If you’ve already passed your Win2K Professional exam, you’re probably anxious to tackle the Win2K Server exam, as you may have heard that the same content you studied for on the Professional exam will also help you pass Server. This is true—the Win2K Server exam will test you on some common Professional topics like OS installation, hardware installation, driver signing, Active Directory Group Policy, Security (EFS, auditing), performance monitoring, printing, backup and restore, OS troubleshooting utilities and recovery options, Remote Access, and Task scheduling. In addition, there are also server-specific topics like DFS, Terminal Services, server upgrades and a lot of disk management. If that’s not enough, I also suspect Microsoft is doing a little bit of question-pool borrowing, slipping questions from the other core exams like Network Infrastructure and Directory Services into the Server exam. Microsoft won’t fess up to this, but I have my suspicions that it’s a way for them to combat the proliferation of Internet brain dumps.

Question No.1
You want to upgrade a Windows NT Server 4.0 computer named PEON1 to Windows 2000 Server. PEON1 is currently a member server in a Windows 2000 domain named ABC.COM. The domain was recently switched from Mixed to Native mode. You want to change the role of PEON1 from a member server to an ABC.COM domain controller.

What should you do? (Choose two.)

1. Use Server Manager to promote PEON1 to the PDC for the ABC.COM domain.
2. Reinstall Windows NT Server 4.0 on PEON1 as a BDC in the ABC.COM domain.
3. Upgrade PEON1 to Windows 2000 Server.
4. Run DCPROMO to install PEON1 as a DC in the XYZ.COM domain.
5. Run the Active Directory Installation wizard to make PEON1 a domain controller in the ABC.COM.

Question 1 Analysis
At first glance, this question doesn’t look all that difficult, but a word to the wise—read all the answers before answering the question. So what’s the problem here? Well, your task is to make a lowly NT 4.0 member server a Win2K DC. First notice the current status of PEON1—a member server running NT 4.0 in a Win2K domain. Is this even possible in a Native mode Win2K domain? Sure it is, as the decision to switch from Mixed mode to Native mode only affects the status of current NT 4.0 DCs (BDCs)—not member servers or workstations. So there’s nothing wrong with an NT 4.0 member server in a Native-mode Win2K domain, but NT4.0 BDCs wouldn’t function in a Native mode domain. If you knew that little tidbit of knowledge, then you could eliminate answer B.

Let’s go on to the next step in our process of elimination. Answer A doesn’t make a lot of sense either, following the same logic we used to eliminate Answer B. If the Win2K domain is already in Native mode, the NT 4.0 PDC and all NT4.0 BDCs have already been upgraded to Win2K. Not to mention that Answer A isn’t even technically feasible, as in NT 4.0 a member server would have had to be reinstalled from scratch to make it a DC.

OK, now we only need to eliminate one more answer to narrow down the two remaining correct answers. Since we may not be sure about what answer C is telling us just yet, we can set it aside and analyze answers D and E first. You may have heard of a utility called DCPROMO, which is used to create a Win2K DC. Did you also know that its alias is the “Active Directory Installation Wizard?” If that’s the case, then answers D and E seem to be saying the same thing, right? Wrong. If you read carefully, you’ll see that answer D is placing the DC in the wrong domain—XYZ.COM instead of ABC.COM. So we can eliminate D, which leaves the correct answers as C and E.

You can upgrade an NT 4.0 member server to Win2K, but it’ll still be a member server. If you then want to make it a DC, you must use DCPROMO—the AD Installation Wizard—to take it to the next level. You see how tricky Microsoft can be here.

Question No. 2
You are running a number of 32-bit and two 16-bit applications called SWEET16.EXE and NOTSOSWEET16.EXE on a server called MYCPUHURTS. To isolate the 16-bit applications from each other, they were started in separate memory spaces using the START command. You want to do some benchmark testing of all user application processes by using system monitor. You add all of the 32-bit applications instances to your chart but you are not sure how to add the 16-bit processes.

How do you accomplish this?

1. Add the SWEET16 and NOTSOSWEET16 instances for the % Processor Time counter for the Process object.
2. Add the NTVDM, SWEET16 and NOTSOSWEET16 instances for the % Processor Time counter for the Process object.
3. Add only the NTVDM instance for the % Processor Time counter for the Process object.
4. Add the NTVDM1 and NTVDM #2 instances for % Processor Time counter for the Process object.

Question No. 2 Analysis
I know what you’re thinking. Why don’t those 16-bit applications just go away? Who runs 16-bit apps anymore anyway? Well, Microsoft seems hell-bent on making sure you understand the problems with their evil little offspring. If you’re an NT 4.0 MCSE, you should be able to answer this question fairly easily. If you’re new to the field and don’t harken back to the days of daily—sometimes hourly—GPFs and OS reboots (No, I’m not referring to Windows 95, but its ancestor Windows 3.1.), let me fill you in. In the beginning, 16-bit applications ran on top of Windows 3.1, Windows 3.1 ran on top of DOS, DOS barely ran at all, and things were not good.

Then Windows NT came along. Windows NT and 2000 support 16-bit apps by simulating the old days—in other words, 16-bit apps run in a simulated Windows 3.1 environment called WOW (which some claim stands for Windows 3.1 Only Worse), which in turn runs in a simulated DOS environment called NTVDM. When you run multiple 16-bit apps on Windows NT 4.0, they’re all forced into the same virtual world, meaning there’s one WOW on top of one NTVDM. When you run them in separate memory spaces, each has its own little simulated world, namely NTVDM and NTDM#1. When you’re monitoring these applications, you can’t monitor them directly, but instead must monitor the simulated world in which they run. Therefore, D is the correct answer.

Question No. 3
You are managing a Windows 2000 Active Directory domain. The domain contains a mixture of Windows NT 4.0 client computers and Windows 2000 Professional client computers. You create an NT 4.0 system policy and place it on the Windows 2000 Server computer that holds the FSMO role of PDC emulator. The system policy denies users access to Network Neighborhood. You then install Terminal Services on one of the Windows 2000 servers and Terminal Services client software on all of the client computers. You find that Terminal Services clients can still browse the network when they open My Network Places in their terminal session.

What should you do to prevent all users from browsing the network?

1. Copy the NTCONFIG.POL file to all client computers.
2. Edit the local registry on each client computer to deny access to My Network Places.
3. Create a Windows 2000 Group Policy that denies access to My Network Places.
4. Modify the Windows NT .ADM file so that user access is restricted to both My Network Places and Network Neighborhood. Place the system policy file on the terminal server.

Question No. 3 Analysis
You definitely have to know how policies work in an AD and NT 4.0 domain to answer this question, so let’s start with the basics. In an NT 4.0 domain, you can set policy restrictions for client computers by using a policy file called NTCONFIG.POL. You create this file, set the policies in it and then copy it to DCs for NT 4.0-based clients to download. Even if all your DCs are Win2K-based, you can still copy the NTCONFIG.POL file to them and restrict your NT 4.0 computers. Win2K client computers, however, don’t read NT 4.0 system policies, but instead read and apply Win2K Group Policy.

The problem here is that although the NT 4.0-based computers don’t have access to Network Neighborhood to browse the network (because of the restrictions in NTCONFIG.POL), they’re browsing the network through their terminal server session. Since the terminal server is a Win2K computer, it stands to reason that users are using it as a back door to browse because the terminal server itself isn’t applying the restrictive policy. All of the Win2K client computers can browse regardless if they’re in a terminal session or not because NT 4.0 system policy simply doesn’t apply to them. To solve this problem, set restrictions for the Win2K computers (including the terminal server) through an AD Group Policy that disables My Network Places. Thus, answer C is correct.

The Win2K Server exam is on par with the Win2K Professional exam in level of difficulty, but raises the bar by increasing the amount of technical content you must absorb in preparation for the exam. If you’ve passed the Professional exam, you’re well on your way to passing Server, since much of the content’s repeated. But you’ll have to beef up on the server-specific topics mentioned previously. Also, don’t be surprised if Microsoft throws you a teaser question here and there from the other core exams. Finally, use your test taking skills to maximize your test question/answer analysis, as some of those questions are just downright tricky.