Interview Questions for L2 Engineer in Infrastructure Management Companies

Infrastructure management companies in India Like HCL, WIPRO, TCS, Microland, HP, EDS, MPHASIS, IBM, etc. Even other companies ask the below questions when recruiting a windows professional for L2 level.
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These questions would help in the interviews conducted for positions open in Infrastructure management companies for the post of WINTEL L2 positions. These are common questions which are always asked. ================================================================================

1. How to check AD configured properly?Ans: Check NTDS and SYSVOL shared folder at %systemroot%windows\.

2. How to transfer global catalog to another domain?Ans: We can not transfer the global catalog; we can only remove the global catalog from one server and enable other server as a global catalog.

3. How to configure global catalog server?Ans: Go to Active directory site and services and expand till your desire server’s NTDS settings and then right click; property and check mark the Global catalog check box.

4. What are the fsmo roles and it gets down what will impact?
Ans: Flexible Single Master Operation, There are five roles.
Domain Naming Master (Forest wide role)
Schema Master (Forest wide role)
PDC Emulator (Domain wide role)
RID Master (Domain wide role)
Infrastructure Master (Domain wide role)

5. What is the RID pool?Ans: RID Master provides the RID (Relative Identifier) pool to Domain controller of the Domain. When an object is create in a domain, a Unique SID (Security ID) is assigned to it which consisting of a RID (Unique ID) and a SID (Common ID for all Object), A RID pool contain 500 RIDs.

6. How to check FSMO roles running on which server? 
Ans: By using “DCdiag /test:Knowsofroleholders /v” command.
ii) Type “Netdom query fsmo”

7. How to transfer FSMO role one domain controller to another domain controller command prompt and GUI?Ans: Go to Start->Run->dsa.msc go the property of users and computers and transfer the RID, PDC, and Infrastructure roles.
Go to Start à Run->go to the property of the active directory domain and trust and transfer the Domain naming master role
For transferring schema master role, first we have to register the schema master by using “regsvr32 schmgmt.dll” command in run. Than Go start à Runà MMCàAdd Active directory schema and transfer the schema master role.

8. What is AD data base file and log file where it stored is and what is the use of log file?
Ans: AD Data base is NTDS.DIT and its location is %system root%\windows\NTDS\ntds.dit. AD Log files are EDB.log ,EDB.chk and REG.log and the location of there files are %system root%\windows\NTDS\ntds.dit.

9. How to recover corrupted AD data base file?
Ans: Its described very well in the article available here. 

10. Is it possible to rename domain name in windows 2003?Ans: Yes, We can rename the domain name in windows 2003.

11. What are the two types of replication?
Ans: Inter-site replication, Intra-site replication.

12. What are the protocols used in replication?
Ans: RPC and SMTP. Predominantly RPC is used. SMTP is not used as its not recommended for replication of Domain Partition. 

Replication conflict is managed using a method described here. Read the full article several times and you would be happy that you got to know something very important. 

13. What is default time for replication?
Ans: KCC (Knowledge Consistency Checker) is the algorithm and the two protocols used are RPC over IP and SMTP over IP. They replicate in every 15 min.

14. What is the difference between the two types of replication i.e. intrasite and intersite? 
Intersite replication is for replication with in the site and Intra-site replication is for the replication between the sites.

15. What are replication partition and tell about partition?
Ans: FSMO role Partition
Schema CN=Schema,CN=configuration, DC=
Domain Naming Master CN=configuration,DC=
PDC DC=
RID DC=
Infrastructure DC=
Replication partitions are.
Schema Partition
Configuration Partition
Domain Partition
Application Partition

16. Is application partition available in windows 2003?
Ans: Yes, Windows 2003 contains application partition, mainly application partition contains the application information like: DNS

17. What is the DNS?
Ans: Domain Naming System.
Used to resolve the host name (FQDN) name to IP Address and Vice Versa

18. What are types of DNS and zones?
(i)Primary DNS zone
(ii)Secondary DNS zone
(iii)Active directory integrated zone
(IV)Stub zone

To know more about DNS please read the blog http://dnsfunda.blogspot.com


19. What is the Start of Authority (SOA) record and is its use?
Ans: It contains information like the server name where the file was created (Primary DNS Server name), it Maintains the serial number and increments it after every change in the DNS Zone, stores Refresh interval and Retry interval time, maintains TTL of the records as well. Read this article for more details. 

@   IN  SOA     nameserver.place.dom.  postmaster.place.dom. (
                               1            ; serial number
                               3600         ; refresh   [1h]
                               600          ; retry     [10m]
                               86400        ; expire    [1d]
                               3600 )       ; min TTL   [1h]

20. What are records available in dns?
Ans: Address records, Host Records, MX Records, and CNAME records.

21. Explain about SRV, MX and CNAME records?
ANS: SRV records point a client to the servers which are hosting a service. For example Active Directory Service. MXrecord points to the client to servers hosting mail service. MX stands for Mail Exchanger. CNAME record is a alias record for a name that already exists. Suppose there were two servers and both of them consolidated into one, in that case one name becomes useless. But any application dependent on unused name has to work, in that case we create an alias record which is the unused name pointing to the name in use. Hence the application keeps functioning. 

22. Where DNS file stored and data base of DNS?
Ans: %SYSTEMROOT%\Windows\System32\DNS

23. How do I configure DHCP Server and steps?
ANS: If you have already installed DHCP on the server then follow the steps mentioned in this Trainsignal Article. 

24. How to reserve IP address?Ans: We can assign a particular IP address to the MAC address of a machine using IP reservation in DHCP.

25. Why do we need two or more subnets?ANS: To segment or restrict/localize one type of traffic to one segment or subnet of the network.

26. If we have two different subnets then how do I configure it in single DHCP server?
ANS: Two different scopes are created for two subnets.

27. What is the use of relay agent?
A router drops the DHCP packet as its a broadcast packet. When we enable the relay agent option on the router it then lets the DHCP Broadcast packets pass through. Hence the relay agent helps in sending it over to the destined subnet.

28. What is the group policy?
Ans: It is way to provide the desirable predefined environment to all users in an Active Directory environment and it is centrally manageable.

29. My requirement is to need disable USB port, how will you do?
Through Group policy.

30. How to take a backup of group policy?
Ans: We can use GPMC (Group Policy Management Console), right click on the GPO and select backup and take backup on destination folder

31. You are an administrator and my requirement is to configure active directory for four different locations. How will you plan it?
Ans: Depending on the requirement I' ll configure one parent domain and three child domains, or One domain with four sites, or four different domains (least preferred).

32. What are the two modes a terminal server works in?
ANS: User mode and applciation mode.

33. What is the default security group, groups give explanations?
Ans:

34. You are maintaining remote servers that you can take remote but you can’t ping them, how to troubleshoot?

35. What is use of Kerberos protocol?
Ans: Kerberos protocol is an authentication protocol. When we login in an Active Directory environment its the protocol that is used to authenticate us.

36. What is the version Kerberos protocol?
Ans: We are using Kerberos V 5.0.

37. What is the authentication protocol in Windows NT?
Ans: Windows NT supported two kinds of challenge/response authentication:
LanManager (LM) challenge/response
Windows NT challenge/response (also known as NTLM challenge/response)

38. What are RAID levels?
Ans: Main RAID levels are RAID-0, RAID-1, RAID-5 and RAID-10.

39. Which RAID you will recommend and why?
Ans: RAID-1 for O.S - mirroring
         RAID-5 for DATA partition- Stripe set with parity.

40. What are the different RAID1 and RAID 5?RAID-1:- In RAID-1 two hard disk are there and the data on one is mirrored to another. So even if one fails other one is there with the same data for service continuity.
RAID-5: We can use minimum three hard disk and maximum depend upon RAID controller card, Data written on disk in stripes with distributed parity set.


41. What are the Different between and disk mirroring and disk duplexing?

Ans: 

Disk Mirroring: Disk mirroring (also known as RAID-1) is the practice of duplicating data in separate volumes on two hard disks to make storage more fault-tolerant. Mirroring provides data protection in the case of disk failure, because data is constantly updated to both disks. However, since the separate disks rely upon a common controller, access to both copies of data is threatened if the controller fails.

Disk Duplexing: Disk duplexing is a variation of disk mirroring in which each of multiple storage disks has its own SCSI controller. Disk duplexing overcomes this problem; the use of redundant controllers enables continued data access as long as one of the controllers continues to function. 
Since the controllers for each disk are different, one of the disks keeps working even if the other disk fails or one of the disk controller fails. So it gives us the luxury to plan for the downtime based on our convinience. Another benefit of disk duplexing is increased throughput. Using a technique known as a split seek, whichever disk can deliver the requested data more quickly responds. Multiple requests may also be split between the disks for simultaneous processing.


42. What is the dynamic disk?Dynamic disks provide the ability to create volumes that span multiple disks (spanned and striped volumes) and the ability to create fault-tolerant volumes (mirrored and RAID-5 volumes).Dynamic disks offer greater flexibility for volume management because they use a database to track information about dynamic volumes on the disk and about other dynamic disks in the computer. Because each dynamic disk in a computer stores a replica of the dynamic disk database, for example, a corrupted dynamic disk database can repair one dynamic disk by using the database on another dynamic disk.

Dynamic disks are a separate form of volume management that allows volumes to have noncontiguous extents on one or more physical disks. Dynamic disks and volumes rely on the Logical Disk Manager (LDM) and Virtual Disk Service (VDS) and their associated features. These features enable you to perform tasks such as converting basic disks into dynamic disks, and creating fault-tolerant volumes. To encourage the use of dynamic disks, multi-partition volume support was removed from basic disks, and is now exclusively supported on dynamic disks.

The following operations can be performed only on dynamic disks:
1) Create and delete simple, spanned, striped, mirrored, and RAID-5 volumes.
2) Extend a simple or spanned volume.
3) Remove a mirror from a mirrored volume or break the mirrored volume into two volumes.
4) Repair mirrored or RAID-5 volumes.
5) Reactivate a missing or offline disk.



43. What is disk striping?
Ans: Disk striping is the technique of spreading data over multiple disks. The data to be stored is divided into blocks and spread across several partitions on various hard disk. Disk striping is used with or without equivalence. Disk striping helps in improving the performance of the disk.


44. What are the backup types?
Ans: 
(i) Normal or full Backup
(ii) Deferential Backup
(iii)Incremental Backup
(iv)Copy backup
(v)Daily Backup

45. Which type backup reset archive bits?
Ans: The bit which has check mark on the folder whose backup has been done using normal backup method.

46. What is the use of DFS?
Ans: Distributed File System, It is used for the fault tolerance because it makes the duplicate copy of every DFS root. Not only that the domain login process as well uses DFS to find out the nearest DC to login.

47. Do you know about FRS?
Ans: File Replication Services.
Example: Replication of SYSVOL folder.

48. What are difference between TCP and UDP protocol?
Ans: TCP is a connection orientated protocol while UDP is not a connection orientated protocol.

49. What is different between HUB and Switch?Ans: HUB broadcast the data packet but Switches multicast the data packet into the network which reduces the collision of data packets.

50. Which layer of OSI model does the Router works in? 
Ans: One layer Three (Network layer)

51. You are going to migrate the domain how to plan?
Ans: The answer is here.

52. For project requirement you going to share 20 folders what is the step you will take?
53. What is the need of a VLAN?Ans: To divide/restrict the traffic into one segment of the network.

54. What kind of privilege is required to transfer FSMO roles?
Ans. logged-on user should be a member of the Enterprise Administrators group to transfer Schema master or Domain naming master roles, or a member of the Domain Administrators group of the domain where the PDC emulator, RID master and the Infrastructure master roles are being transferred.

55. Write down the command line to transfer all the FSMO roles to other server?
Ans: Click Start, click Run, type ntdsutil in the Open box, and then click OK
Type roles, and then press ENTER.
Type connections, and then press ENTER.
Type connect to server servername, and then press ENTER, where servername is the name of the domain controller that you want to assign the FSMO role to.
At the server connections prompt, type q, and then press ENTER.
Type transfer role, where role is the role that you want to transfer. For example,
To transfer the RID master role, type transfer schema master
To transfer the RID master role, type transfer domain naming master
To transfer the RID master role, type transfer rid master
To transfer the RID master role, type transfer pdc
To transfer the RID master role, type transfer infrastructure master
7. At the fsmo maintenance prompt, type q, and then press ENTER to gain access to the ntdsutil prompt.

56. Write down the command line to seize all the FSMO roles to a server?Ans:
Click Start, click Run, type ntdsutil in the Open box, and then click OK
Type roles, and then press ENTER.
Type connections, and then press ENTER.
Type connect to server servername, and then press ENTER, where servername is the name of the domain controller that you want to assign the FSMO role to.
At the server connections prompt, type q, and then press ENTER.
Type seize role, where role is the role that you want to seize. For example,
To seize the RID master role, type seize schema master
To seize the RID master role, type seize domain naming master
To seize the RID master role, type seize rid master
To seize the RID master role, type seize pdc
To seize the RID master role, type seize infrastructure master.
7. At the fsmo maintenance prompt, type q, and then press ENTER to gain access to the ntdsutil prompt.

57. Command for removing active directory?
Ans: dcpromo /forceremoval

58. How to test whether a domain controller is also a global catalog server: 

Click Start, point to Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Active Directory Sites and Services.

Double-click Sites in the left pane, and then locate the appropriate site or click Default-first-site-name if no other sites are available.

Open the Servers folder, and then click the domain controller.

In the domain controller's folder, double-click NTDS Settings.

On the Action menu, click Properties.

On the General tab, view the Global Catalog check box to see if it is selected.