Moving of Exchange Server to New Server. 1

[rolmank]

Hi all, I'm new to this forum.

Hope any one can provide advice/help for me.

Currently my company have this Compaq Proliant 3000, with 5 x 4.3 HDD and Exchange 5.5 sitting in it.( Is a regional Exchange Server)

And I intend to move the entire information from this Proliant 3000 to a new Server, Proliant DL380 G2 with 3 x18.2 GB HDD. And remove the Proliant 3000 after the moving.

But I have doubts on the Information Store Service. I have seen few articles that Information Store Service could not start after the Copying/Moving the data. And this is what I'm worry.

I will appreciate if I can get help/advice from any of u.


Thanks and Regards
Roland

 

[rubbaninja]

I'll be doing the same.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q155216

 

[rolmank]

Hi rubbaninja, thanks for your reply.

I have seen this article too! B-)

But I'm worry about the Information store serivce after moving exchange Server.

And from that Q155216, is it a must to configure the drive exactly same as my Old Server. And is it mean that if the DL380 harddisk capacity is larger than my old server, but same drive as it configured at the old server. It should be fine?? Wondering....wondering! Doubts...doubts...

Btw, hope we can success in this operation! :



Thanks and Regards
Rolank

 

[mbagi]

The easy& save way to do this is to install your new exchange server ,join your exsting site, and leave the old server running , then from exchange admin move all mail boxes to the new server , and rehomed your public folder to the new server , then you can uninstall the exchnge server from your old server.

 

[rolmank]

Hi mbagi, sorry for being rude. May I know have you tried this method before. Cos my Big boss will scream at me like crazy if things won't work well. :-(

I'm so troubled with this issue.

Btw thanks for your advice. I really appericate it. Thanks and Regards
Rolank

 

[mbagi]

Yes , just install your new server as a backup server for domain , then install the exchange , join your existing site , then Move the mail boxes to the new server , and rehomed the public folder to the new server also.
At last you will loose no thing because your server will still be running , don't uninstall it until you get sure that every thing is ok , also you keep it running becaause it will direct the users to the new server (you don't need to configure your users profile manualy).

 

[rolmank]

Hi mbagi,million of thanks, now I have the confident level to carry out the job.

Thanks for your advice and help. Thanks and Regards
Rolank

 

[people2]

Hi

just a quick note, we carried ot the same process and all worked ok. however

remember to move your offline address book to the new server if you use it, also once the move is successfull and tested remove the old sever from the site while its still up, there are some microsoft aricles about this

hope it all goes well

 

[MikeMeade]

Hello all, I also am faced with this task. Nothing to add to the thread but my thanks for making it so clear.
regards,
Mike

 

[rubbaninja]

Well, doing the move to a server with a different name is not what you had said. This is, of course, the easy way to do it. I have written instructions for that but you have to be sharp to keep up with it to understand the cliff noting style.

As far as the MSKB I posted, that will work REGARDLESS. My plan:

- Current server "Mailserver"
- New server "Mailserver(new)" The "(new)" will not be in the computer name, it's just for understanding what I am writing.

- Current data "Mailserver":
-----Directory Database: F:\...
-----Directory Transaction Logs: F:-----Directory Working Path: C:-----Private Info Store: E:-----Public Info Store: E:-----Information Store Transaction Logs: F:-----Information Store Working Path: C:---You can find all this information too by going into the properties of "Mailserver" which is the machine your relocating. (Alt-Enter on the server under the site)

-Drive configuration only matters for drive LETTERS not Raid settings, from what I understand Exchange only cares that I restore this server using the same directory structure and not the same hardware Raid, which is only at RAID 0 on the "Mailserver". "Mailserver" only has 4 18.9 GB drives. The new server will have 6 39gb drives in RAID 5 configuration.

-New Server drive layout:
C: D: E: F:. This will be my new database path on "Mailserver(new)" which is the database path same as "Mailserver" although there is MUCH more space on this box. Example; C:\ on the old server is 8gigs, new server will be C:\ 20 gig before even starting the move. E:\ old server is 18gig, new server 40 gig. ETC.

-Restore data to "Mailserver(new)" after "Mailserver" is shut down.

-After moving the data to the new box I will run Exchange Optimizer to redo the database paths on "Mailserver(new) to wherever I want which moves data from the database paths (C: E: f that I brought over from the old "Mailserver"

-Start servives on "Mailserver(new)"

Basically, its about directory "paths" (drive letter layout and the such) and not drive raid/size configuration. Only thing that the new box needs to accomodate the MSKB article is the same directory structure. Once data is moved and I'm happy I will run optimizer to move the data to whereever I like and recreate drive configuration to have what I want.

Hope I didn't confuse by over explaining, it's very easy.

It can't hurt either way because your original server is still there whereas if you were to do a move mailbox operation on all boxes your taking the risk of corruption.
Not to mention you wont have the latest copy of your old server readily available to switch back on if something goes wrong like maybe a network hiccup causing your CIO's mailbox to go to the bit bucket in the sky! It's your choice though, I have done it many times by having a machine of a different name to move the data too and I *will* be doing it the MSKB way of moving it to a box of the same name (Our main mailserver is also handles the SMTP mail, routing and has all the connections on it. Info store is almost 40 gigs alone!

http://www.exchangefaq.org/managing/0007.php3

http://www.exchangefaq.org/managing/0023.php3

 

[rpatel4]

Is it possible to set up a new exchange box with the directory drives set up the way you want them and with a new computer name and just move the mailboxes over? We have already built our new exchange box with a different directory structure and we have added a drive so we cannot use the mskb way. How do I move the mailboxes from exchange administrator?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Rpatel

 

[rubbaninja]

You have to have both machines under the same site. If they are seperate sites under the same organization then it's a bit more tough and good luck. Do a search for "Moving mailboxes within the same organization" or something like that.

 

[SOKO]

Hi i have done exactly what u are asking with only 2 problems. I moved an Exchange 5.5 server to a and NEW server with the same name. I went from NT to Win2000 also.

Follow the directions here:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q155216

Just a tip for you though, make sure you have a cable plugged into your nic even if the other end is not plugged in. If not the Internet Mail Service will fail to install. Also if you are going from NT to Win2000 make sure that you change the computer name on the Win2000 maching to use the DNS naming convention or else the install will bomb on the Internet Mail Service. Example if your NT box computer name is EXHANGE1 and your domain is NAME.COM then the Win2000 computer name should be EXHANGE1.NAME.COM

These are the only 2 problems that i encountered.
Hope this helps you along the way.

SOKO

 

[kzone]

I am plan to move an WinNT Exchange 5.5 server to a NEW win2000 Exchange 5.5 server with different name.
The new server will be located in data centre, the old server will keep running until the new one is working fine.any recommendation for doing this ?


Thanks for all.

Cheers
Kzone

 

[Su513]

I've done this, several times, and to be honest it's never very pretty /

The easiest way I have found is to install the new server as a BDC. Service pack it up to the same level as the other, and then install exchange.

Exchange will ask you if you want to connect to an existing site during the install. If you do this, the theory is that you can then use Tools/Move Mailbox from within exchange admin to get all the mailboxes across. If you leave the network running with the two servers, the original mail server will redirect any mailbox logons to the new server, so once you're happy everyone has logged on at least once, you can remove the old server. Depending on your set up, at this point you might even want to promote it to a PDC.

Hope this helps - I know it's repeating a lot of what others have already posted.

Susie

 

[DanIT]

Rpatel - If you need to move mailboxes between sites you can use exmerge.exe. Search on the web for it.

It does a 2 step process - it builds a PST from the mailbox, then imports it into the new server. The only tricky part is that you have to delete the old SMTP address, replicate sites, then add the new SMTP address.