What are the considerations for upgrading to Directory and Resource Administrator 8.5? (NETIQKB71796)

What are the considerations for upgrading to Directory and Resource Administrator 8.5?

What should I consider before upgrading to DRA 8.5?

Before upgrading to Directory and Resource Administrator (DRA) 8.5, please review the following notes.  Ensure that your environment is prepared for upgrading to DRA 8.5 and it meets all hardware/software requirements.

• Your domain functional level must be at a minimum of 2000 Native Mode.  DRA 8.5 will not recognize the ADAM group specified during install/upgrade in Mixed Mode environments.
• It is strongly recommended that DRA 8.5 not be installed on domain controllers.
• DRA 8.5 requires that an ADAM (Active Directory Application Mode) instance be installed on each DRA server.
• Virtual Attributes, once created, can not be deleted, but they can be disabled.
• Create the Domain Local Security Group used to access ADAM before installing or upgrading to DRA 8.5.
• DRA 8.5 has many new permissions requirements. Please see Permissions Requirements on p. 21 in the Administration Installation Guide for more information.
• In addition to the NetIQ Administration Service, DRA 8.5 now also installs two new services:
  • NetIQ DRA Core Service
  • NetIQ Log Archive Service
• It is recommended to keep DRA Core Service and Log Archive Service accounts the same.
• DCOM configuration is now automatically handled during install or upgrade and is configured differently from previous versions.
• FSA has been removed from the installer, but it is not removed during an upgrade.
• Remote installation of DRA Reporting is not supported.
• Trace Audit is mandatory while NT Audit is optional. NT Audit events can be enabled with a registry key.
• On Windows 2008 servers, success audits are displayed as ?Information? events. 
• DRA 8.5 employs three new collectors for Reporting:
  • AD Collector
  • DRA Collector
  • Resource Collector
• All collectors will be executed by NetIQ DRA Core Service.
• New Roles and Powers are introduce for collectors and DRA Reporting.
• Collectors can be scheduled to run at different time periods on different DRA Servers.
• Reporting configuration can be done only from Primary DRA Server.
• MSSQL Server can be Default or Named instance.
• Collectors can be configured to use override access accounts.
• The DRA Reporting Tool (Access-based) on previous versions is not removed during an upgrade. The data it contains cannot be converted to the new Reporting database.
• The DRA 8.5 SDK is not updated. The SDS will be updated post-DRA 8.5 release and made available on the NetIQ Support web site.

Formerly known as NETIQKB71796