New Functionality in Windows Server 2008 DNS

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 have improved their version of DNS in many different ways. This section covers this new functionality. Here are some of the new DNS features from Windows Server 2008:

• Background zone loading
• Support for TCP/IP version 6 (IPv6)
• Read-only domain controllers
• GlobalName zone

Background Zone Loading

If an organization had to restart a DNS server with an extremely large Active Directory Integrated DNS zones database in the past, DNS had a common problem with an Active Directory Integrated DNS zone. After the DNS restart, it could take hours for DNS data to be retrieved from Active Directory. During this time, the DNS server was unable to service any client requests.