Error during dcpromo: “The source server is currently rejecting replication requests”

You cannot demote a domain controller using dcpromo. You receive the following error:

There’s a good chance your Domain Controller has an important service not running or, most likely, replication has been disabled for some reason.

Here are some quick things you can do to test:

In your source domain controller, head to Active Directory Sites and Services
Expand the sites until you find the server you are trying to demote.
Right click the NTDS settings under that server and try to replicate both TO and FROM that server.
See what fails for your

If replication truly is disabled, you won’t be able to replicated either to or from the domain controller.

Complete the following to perform the fix:

Launch an elevated command prompt
Run either of these commands, depending on which issue you are having, either INBOUND, OUTBOUND, or sometimes both.
1. repadmin /options MyDC1 -DISABLE_OUTBOUND_REPL
2. repadmin /options MyDC1 -DISABLE_INBOUND_REPL
  1. Note: Replace MyDC1 with the name of your domain controller.
  2. Note: It sounds like this command is disabling, but it’s really an enable.
Services you need to check to make sure are running. It wouldn’t hurt to restart both of them:
1. NETLOGON
2. Windows Time

That should be it. Give it a test again in Sites and Services and then try to demote your Domain Controller again. Let us know how it goes.

Cheers!

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