A guide or book for installation of Exchange 2010?

[JonathanMortimer]

Hi,

Is there a definitive guide for installing Exchange 2010 on Server 2008 R2? Online or in a book, either is good. I find the Microsoft website impossible to read and the various blogs I find seem to be patchy and make assumptions of steps already performed or knowledge of how to do certain things; I need something with every single step outlined with precise instructions on what to run, what roles to install (and with which options where necessary), features, commands to run for the prep, etc etc.

If anyone can help with this I would be very grateful! I will buy a book if necessary, but it needs to cover complete installation and set up of both 2008 R2 and Exchange 2010 (for an Exchange server with a separate Domain server environment, both 2008 R2).

I ask because when we decided to go with Exchange 2010 it was still very new, guides were even patchier then than they are now, and I'm not convinced that we got it set up correctly (it is now in use so it's too late to start again with that one, but fortunately the only thing not working now is the Out of Office Assistant from within Outlook 2007). I want to practice in VMs so that next time I will get it right.

 

[JonathanMortimer]

I have found a few of contenders:

Mastering Windows Server 2008 R2
Mastering Exchange Server 2010

Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed
Exchange Server 2010 Unleashed

These look to be substantial books with good coverage of the subjects, the Unleashed ones appear to have slightly better reviews. Anyone have any of these books or care to comment? My local big bookshops don't tend to keep these in stock, it's mainly just Excel and SQL Database stuff which is of no interest to me, so shelf-reading isn't really an option and Amazon don't show enough in their preview pages (it just has the pre-amble and index).

 

[58sniper]

I'm somewhat partial to the Mastering Exchange 2010 book because I wrote some of the chapters. But if you've ever read some of Jim McBee's books, you'll know they are very good for those people "in the trenches".

If you're looking for a thorough book that dives deep into every the weeds to look at every nut and bolt, look at Tony Redmond's Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Inside Out that JUST came out. His books are always very good as well.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[ShackDaddy]

My favorite is the Exchange Server 2010 Best Practices book by Jagott and Stidley, coauthored by other members of the Microsoft Exchange 2010 team. It skips the dummy stuff and mostly goes straight to the meat.

Dave Shackelford MVP
ThirdTier.net
TrainSignal.com