Recovery Storage Group

[rhysmeister]

I have setup a recovery storage group and and added my mailbox store to it. It is set to run from 11PM to 3AM each night. But nothing seems to have happened. There is nothing stored in the specified backup folders so I can only assume to the backup of my mailbox store has not occured. There is a white round circle with a red arrow pinting down placed over the icon of the Recovery Storage Group \ Mailbox Store.

 

[RichieRich75]

Check this link out for using Exchange Recovery Storage Groups.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/2003/library/ue2k3rsg.mspx

You didn't say what exactly you had running from 11pm - 3am each night.

 

[rhysmeister]

The Maintenance Interval is set to run from 11PM to 3AM. All I want to do is backup the mailboxes on the server. Can't seem to find a simple how to.

 

[crobin1]

The Recovery Storage Group is for restoring information to Exchange from a backup, not for making a backup of Exchange.

The built-in NTBackup can backup Exchange, as well as products from Veritas, Computer Associates, etc.

 

[rhysmeister]

Sorted it with the Volume Shadow COpy feature, I was trying with the 'M' drive feature as well but apparently virus scans can corrupt the 'M' drive. Just used the included backup utility to the other server where it is then backed up onto tape. ;-)

 

[SR7758]

If you want to backup your mailbox store use the exchange server's NT Backup. You will need to do two separate backups one of the System State Data and another of the Exchange information store. Trying to do both one backup will cause it to fail. Make sure to use shadow copy feature so speed it up. We have a 42GB database and it only takes about 1.5 hrs to run. I wouldn't use the Recovery Storage Group unless you're restoring.

I'm probably going to get bashed for saying that MS has a good help feature, but, they have a very informative webinar on Exchange 2k3 disaster recover here:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/events/exchange2003/tnt1-101.mspx

It helped me out a lot.


S.R.

 

[rhysmeister]

Thanks, I'll add the system state as well. Regarding distaster recovery I recommend Ontrack PowerControls, expensive, but a powerful tool for the worst kinds of disaters. With this in your armoury you sleep easy.