Increase 16GB Limit on Exchange Standard

[markdmac]

It is now official,

The upcoming release of Exchange 2003 SP2 will increase the mailbox storage limit from 16GB to 75GB.

http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/downloads/2003/sp2/overview.mspx

I hope you find this post helpful.

Regards,

Mark

 

[MikeBatters]

It will indeed although they are being pretty vague about the release date - 2nd half 2005......

Oh Well.

Mike

*************************************

Remember - There is always another way..........

 

[djbourne]

If a temporary increase is needed as the database wont mount.

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=828070

This link explains how to increase the limit to allow you back in. (increases the database maximum by one GB)

Mount the drive delete stuff no longer needed.

Unmount the database and defrag before remounting.

http://www.petri.co.il/defragment_exchange_2000_2003_server_databases.htm

 

[strongm]

The entertaining thing about that fix is that it revealed that the store size limit was simply an arbitary and artificial one imposed by MS (to keep up the price margin on Enterprise)rather than a technical one caused by the selection, say, of a data type that couldn't hold a number bigger than 16Gb. What this further tells you is that 75Gb is also just an arbitary choice ...

 

[MikeBatters]

Indeed you are right but i do not think there was ever any doubt that M$ were in it for the Ca$h....

Mike

*************************************

Remember - There is always another way..........I just haven't found out what it is yet!

 

[jkupski]

The entertaining thing about that fix is that it revealed that the store size limit was simply an arbitary and artificial one imposed by MS (to keep up the price margin on Enterprise)

IIRC, there actually was a technical limitation once upon a time. Exchange Std uses Jet for its data store, while Enterprise uses something else.

I'm actually kind of worried over the new 75GB limitation--while I plan to make use of it (my users, just like everyone else's, constantly demand more storage) we're also planning to implement a new backup system at the same time.

I wonder how many admins are out there who are not considering this fact: restoring a 75GB mail store at DLT-IV speeds will take 4-8 hours. Add in the time required to run ESEUTIL if the store is marked "dirty shutdown" and you're looking at 100% of your users being down for over a business day.

 

[MikeBatters]

I agree. That is why we have migrated many sites to Ultrium3 as the backups are much much quicker.

On a decent server the throughput can be 2GB/min+.

Mike

*************************************

Remember - There is always another way..........I just haven't found out what it is yet!

 

[strongm]

>Exchange Std uses Jet for its data store, while Enterprise uses something else

This is a fallacy

Both Standard and Enterprise use the Extensible Storage Engine which is sometimes referred to as JET - specifically a version known as JET Blue; the more well-known JET, the one used in Access, is Jet Red and is basically a completely different product (way back in 1996, when Exchange 4.0 was released, the version of Jet that it used was somewhat closer to the then version of Jet used in Access, but they have diverged since then)

 

[asktheman]

After you apply SP2 for the forst time the storage is defaulted to 18gb.. to have to set the registry to increase to 75gb (or to 20gb, 30gb etc...) it also increase the size of the public folder store...

Installed IMF v2 (you have to remove IMF first if you have it installed and the new sender ID will be handy..

From testing beta version I have found the removal of probagate settings from public folders a good addition and they have replaced it with a manage settings wizard..

you als0 have a built in option to set/remove public folder replicas.. ( good for migrations) and the direct push feature for OMA is a nice feature to keep the remove device upto date. You also have the option that if the device is not contacted within the threashold you set it will send a auto wipe command.

IMAP setting on a per user bases is another..

any one interested should download MS's CTP version (remember test only as MS have officially said that they will not support the CTP version)))