Very cool free AD Replication Status Tool from Microsoft

Not sure how I missed this, but today I stumbled across the Active Directory Replication Status Tool when reading an article by Ned Pyle from Microsoft about FRS to DFSR migrations.

This tool satisfies my top 3 requirements for a utility:

1. It is free
2. It has useful information in a clean and easy to use interface
3. It isn't bloated unnecessarily (12MB post installation!)

The tool can be downloaded here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30005

There really isn't much to say about the tool, as it is very self-explanatory when you open it. Select Forest, Domain, or Select Targets to specify just a few Domain Controllers.  When you choose Refresh Replication Status, look for the Last Sync Message, Last Successful Sync, and Consecutive Failure Count columns to see how things are doing. You can click Errors Only at the top, and hopefully that will show you an empty screen.

This certainly will not substitute for a good AD Health Check. Neither will this tool fix any issues you find...like...I don't know...someone powers off a Domain Controller they are having problems with and the KCC is like, "What the heck, dude?"

For the "Real men use the command line" crowd, there is nothing this tool does that you can't do yourself with repadmin, powershell, and some time.  You can stroke your red swingline stapler and ignore this blog post.

I do think using screenshots of this tool for documentation purposes could certainly up a SysAdmin's street cred...and who doesn't need that?