Active Directory: is it good to have 127.0.0.1 as DNS server entry on 2 machines that are 2 DNS servers in a local net?

Question

This is a small local net with 10 computers in an office, they are running ms server 2003 active directory with 2 domain controllers. Each of the 2 DCs is also a DNS server and they syncronize. There are no more than these 2 DCs and 8 client machines in the whole domain.

In the config of the only network card of each computer it is like this:

The 8 client machines have an entry of DC1 as 1st and DC2 as 2nd DNS server. DC1 and DC2 both have 127.0.0.1 as DNS server entry.

Is there anything bad about this entry 127.0.0.1? I thought this is simple and clean and microsoft standard? Would it be better to put the own lan address (192.168.0.11 on DC1 and 192.168.0.12 on DC2) and not the loopback address there?

The DNS servers themselves (on DC1 and DC2) do their external lookups on the dsl-router.

Solution

I think that is perfectly fine.

It wouldn't be a good idea to put their LAN IP because if that ever changes, the DNS resolution may be broken. 127.0.0.1 will never change and will always point to the right ressource so you can just leave this as is.

Comments

[user12096]

I hope I added all necessary information, please ask if I forgot something.

[user12096]

Thank you. This is a good point. From your profile I assume you are a "unix person". I would also be interested to hear if there is a different viewpoint from ms philosophy.

[MDMarra]

I think that this stance is pretty platform independent.

[user12096]

"way back" - does this imply there is a different way now for server 2008?

[Keith Stokes]

I recently configured a different domain with Server 2008 and I configured them using 127.0.0.1. They've been running for a couple of months with no trouble.

[Lewis]

I wouldn't choose to make the loopback address the primary DNS entry on a Domain Controller because, generally, networking needs to start before the DNS service has started and the zone has loaded which often times means that attempts to automatically register proper DNS records for the DCs will be inconsistent or fail over to the secondary DNS server anyway. Instead, set DC2's IP as the primary DNS entry on DC1 and then use the loopback address as secondary DNS. Repeat this on DC2 except using DC1's IP as the primary DNS entry.