If you use a query filter with the "Subordinate" or "All"
referral chasing option enabled, only 1.000 rows are returned by the query.
Therefore, if you use this query for an export operation, only 1.000 objects are
exported.
In NNS ADix we perform paged searches to get all objects
queried for, but paged searches are not supported for the referral chasing
options "Subordinate" or "All" (the option "All" includes the option
"Subordinate"). This is not a limitation of NNS ADix, it is a limitation Active
Directory ADSI LDAP provider. This provider does not support subordinate
referrals for paged searches. See the MORE INFORMATION
section to get more information about paged searches.
We do not recommend to enable referral chasing to retrieve
objects from the whole Active Directory Forest. Instead perform a query using
the Global Catalog (GC) to get objects from the whole AD Forest or from subtrees.
See the help topic How to… Export Objects from an Entire Forest for
more information.
The result of a query will be returned in pages of 1.000 rows
per page. 1.000 is the default value. This value can be customized using the
NTDSUtil tool and the MaxPageSize parameter (See
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315071 for more information).
The MaxPageSize parameter controls the maximum number of objects that are
returned in a single search result, independent of how large each returned
object is. To perform a search where the result might exceed this number of
objects, the client must specify the paged search control. This is to group the
returned results in groups that are no larger than the MaxPageSize
value.
We do not recommend to increase the MaxPageSize value. The
MaxPageSize prevents a query which matches a large set of objects
from returning more results than the client is prepared to handle, and also
protects the server from returning large results as a single operation.
Microsoft also mentions these benefits of using paging:
Lower network traffic
The client can be more responsive to the user because the client returns
only one page of data rather than all of the data in the result set.
Fewer resources are needed by the client and server
The client can abandon the search before completion
