Migrating the AD Certificate Authority Service server role from 2012 R2 to 2019 — ‘template information could not be loaded’ error
I recently had a 2012R2 server with AD Certificate Services installed, the server was to be discontinued, so we needed to rebuild on a 2019 server.
It didn’t go quite to plan — so I thought I would share my experience!
The 2019 server was spun up in Azure, and I followed this guidance:
https://www.petenetlive.com/KB/Article/0001473
Steps are broadly as follows:
Step 1: Backup Windows Server 2012 R2 certificate authority database and its configuration
Step 2: Backup CA Registry Settings
Step 3: Uninstall CA Service from Windows Server 2012 R2
Step 4: Install Windows Server 2019 Certificate Services
Step 5: Configure AD CS
Step 6: Restore CA Backup
Step 7: Restore Registry info
NOTE: If you are installing to a machine with a different name, edit the registry backup and replace the old server name with the new one before merging the registry entry.
Step 8: Reissue Certificate Templates