DHCP Reservation (active)/(inactive)

Hi,

We have a Win2k3 DHCP Server with some static reservations based on
MAC address within the DHCP range.

What we've found recently is under the Leases were getting some
reservations showing
Reservation(active)
Reservation(inactive)

for the "Reservation(active)" ones actually for some the PC is already
retired and offline but the DHCP stills shows under the Leases as
"Reservation(active)".

Whats the reason its showing this status?

Many thanks

How long has it been since this machine has been retired? IIRC this is a
lease that hasn't expired yet. Just because a client isn't on the net,
unless you do a release on the ip address it is considered in use until the
expiration period +4 hours.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/261964

Actually the our lease duration is 8 hours and actually the computer
was retired early last week so the record should've expired next week
but for some reasonn its still showing "Reservation(active).

If you refresh the page does it still show that?
If you ping the IP address do you get a reply?

Adding to Paul's response, remember that expired leases may refer to
disconnected computers that may be off the network at the moment but not
necessarily out the network forever. Remember that before starting to delete
something.

I tried refresh and its still there and I'm pretty sure the machines
retired. I also tried a ping and there's no reply so I'm not sure why
its still showing as "Reservation(active) it seems there's actually a
few reservations from the past where the PC is retired but the DHCP
server is still showing it as "Reservation(active)".

[MarcusPiper]

From my experience with DHCP and reservations (quite a lot!) you will always see "Reservation(Active)" after a device has used the reservation, even for a single time and then never connected again on the network.

If you edit the reservation and just change the reservation name, you will see that it changes to "Reservation(Inactive)" - then all you need to do is look again a week later (or whatever time you feel feasible) and if it is still inactive, you can likely remove the reservation.

It's just a Microsoft thing! The assumption is that once it was active, it always is ;-) DHCP does not check it's reservations to see when they were actually last used.

Hope this helps you.