moving or migrating an exchange 2003 server to another 1

[dpu]

Hello can anyone tell me the best way to move an exchange 2003 server to another? I've got an older Exchange 2003 server and i would like to upgrade it to a more powerful server. So I would like to move the .mdb database to the new server. Will migrating work in this scenario?

 

[ntinlin]

Asked and answered many hundreds of times within this forum.
Have a look at all the old posts.

Also suggest you read the 'bible' on the subject which is here:-

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/822931

That should give you the vast majority of the info. you need.


Neill

 

[OneMadCoder]

DPU: Please let me know if this worked for you. I'm thinking of doing the same.

Thanks Ntinlin for the informative link.

 

[ntinlin]

Not a problem.

Only small issue you might have is that when you move a mailbox the dumpster items go bye, bye. So if users are in the habit of recovering items from the dumpster a lot they won't have that option.

You can always exmerge them out as a precaution though if you are that way inclined.

Neill

 

[Duran]

Hello,

I have just done this and I am almost finished, I loaded up the other exchange server, replicated the public folders (I waited a week for this), then moved the mailbox's across over a friday night and went in saturday to check it all went ok. You should move your own mailbox first and wait a couple of days. You should also go to Exchange Native mode if you can, that makes it alot easier.

This is also a good link

http://www.amset.info/exchange/migration.asp

You may read somewhere and get the immpression that you can move a mailbox while someone still has Outlook open, its better if they have it turned off, and in some cases it can take 30 mins for their outlook profile to update, this is why I chose to do them all on a friday night to avoid confusion, so there was no chance of profiles not being updated by the time people came in on Monday.

Regards,
D.

I plug you in, dim the lights,
Electric Barbarella !

 

[Duran]

One more thing I would like to add to that is try to get everyone to empty there deleted items before you move them, this will make the mailboxes smaller and quicker to move. I also found that if peoples passwords have expired, the move of that mailbox will also fail.

I plug you in, dim the lights,
Electric Barbarella !

 

[58sniper]

You can push out a GPO that empties the Deleted Items when they close Outlook.

If you follow kb 822931, you shouldn't have any problems. It's *THE* way to migrate.

Pat Richard
Microsoft Exchange MVP
Contributing author The Complete Reference: Microsoft Exchange Server 2007