How to remove a domain controller so that it remains in AD as a file server?

Question

Active Directory

One of the domain controllers needed to be removed.
But there are some difficulties. There are a lot of balls on this server, and you need to keep it in AD, just remove the role of the domain controller and GC.
Googled - and all the options that I found lead to the fact that the server generally falls out of the domain. This option won't work for me. Permissions are manually set on the balls, and I will not be able to restore them correctly later.
Give advice how to be. It's better if you poke into the manual.
Thank you
Yes, I forgot to specify.
Server: Windows 2003, the domain is naturally also 2003

Answer 1

The question does not say for which version of the server the question is, but in general it is called "downgrading the role of the controller", you can read it here . I won’t check it live, but for other versions the procedure should be similar.

Answer 2

When I transferred the AD host to new hardware, I used this article .
Your task ends here, it remains only to remove unused roles, leaving only the file server role. If the server is NO LONGER the main controller, then simply remove the extra roles by the wizard for 2003 or the server manager for 2008