Secondary Exchange 2003 (low-cost HA solution)

[jsonchan]

Hi all,

i am looking for a cheap/manual failover solution. Actually we do not keep email on the server mailbox, all incoming emails we're diverted to user's personal folder PST.

What if i install a second exchange server within the same ORG on a differnt machine. On the other hand we create an A Record for that secondary server public IP like "mail2.domain.com" and then configure an additional MX Record with a lower priority (Higher number) pointing to the newly created A Record.

i am not sure above is going to be workable or not when the primary exchange down for any reason.



Jason

 

[jsonchan]

Something forgot to mention is that we'll have each of the outlook user setup an additional outlook profile which pointing to secondary Exchange server. In case of any happened with primary, we'll ask our users to switch the outlook to the other profile.

 

[Marcs41]

1: Using an Exchange Server and Clients with PST is rather silly, sorry to say. It is a pain for back-ups and configuration.

2: If you want a fail-over, and cheap, then there is one solution. Get new hardware, image the Main server every night. In case of disaster, put the image on the second server.

Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]

 

[furtech]

Jason,

I'd have to agree with Marc, it seems silly to use Exchange with .PST files - you'd be better off using a Linux Email Server as it's much cheaper with the same setup.

I can't see any reason why what you suggested, Jason, wouldn't work. But instead of setting up a different Outlook profile for the second server I'd suggest adding the second server as another POP3 account in Outlook. So that when a user click 'Send/Receive', Outlook would check both servers for emails - the end user wouldn't even know there is a problem if one of the servers goes down.

Just make sure every user is setup for the second server and is checking it regularly - if a user doesn't check the second server they might miss out on some important emails.

Hope this helps,

---------------------------------------
Matthew Collins

http://www.furtech.net

---------------------------------------

 

[Marcs41]

One 'flaw' if I may say so in this setup is when a server goes down, and it happens to be the one used to send, users WILL notice!
Fall-Over setups are not that simple.

Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]

 

[jsonchan]

Yes, you both are right.

It's really a bad idea keeping email in users' PST. However the situation is that i'm working for a real heavy email traffic company.

However..., it's not quite possible to store their email data in our Exhchange server since a large number of users are hosting 5 - 15GB email data on their own.

Jason

 

[Marcs41]

Heavy e-mail traffic (whatever that is in numbers) is a poor excuse, and a VERY good one to STOP using PSTs!

Just imagine someone with 15GB of E-Mail losing the PST.... I would not want to be there...

Get their act together, and set it up as it should be, or get the server out of there and let them all POP.

Get a decent Back-Up solution and you will sleep better.


Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]

 

[jsonchan]

Marc, thanks for your comment.

It seems one of the better solution is to build a SECOND mail server (SMTP/POP) by using "POSTFIX or SENDMAIL" on Linux platform. And have all users account setup into the same Outlook profile.

Jason

 

[Marcs41]

Jason, I don't think you get the point.

Your current configuration can run without any mailserver just as well. You can put 2, 3, 4 or whatever more servers in there, it will NOT help you out in any way as long as the users have PST's.

All you will achieve is more work for you, more servers (and potentially licenses) to manage.

Make a quick calculation and you will find moving everyone to Exchange + a decent backup far cheaper and easier.
Even the Standard on SP2 can already go up to 75 GB stores, so that should not be an issue.

You do not mention how many users you have, but the ones with 15GB of mail urgently need to be 'educated'!

Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]

 

[jsonchan]

We have about 65 users here.

Asking them not to keep everything in PST is one of the most biggest challenge here. Even our BOSS is the top record keeper...over 15GB. Actually they don't even want you to touch their "Delted item".., it is our company culture and style :-( .

So standard version 75GB might not be enough to bring everone back to the server mailbox.

Jason

 

[Marcs41]

Ask your BOSS what he/she will do if he/she loses that +15GB of maildata.
Scare them, and make VERY sure they will NEVER hold YOU responsible for a disaster if THEY wish to work in an unconventional way.

Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]

 

[58sniper]

You can push out a policy that restricts their ability to use .pst files.

Double Take is a nice failover option. It's guick, painless, works.

Pat Richard, MCSE MCSA:Messaging CNA
Want to know how email works? Read for yourself -

http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2821.txt

 

[jsonchan]

By the time i establish the failover platform i should have each of them (as many as i can..) a tight policy that limited the usage of outlook PST.

However, i still have no any practical conclusion from above. Actually those 3rd party solution like Double Take or WANSync (i prefered) is too expensive for us, as i estimated it may cost about $20,000 totally. But if i implement in an Linux way as a secondary backup mail server, we may all miss the Global Address List in Outlook.

Can someone enlighten me please!

Jason

 

[58sniper]

Double Take would be about 5600 plus hardware. A failover server doesn't need to match your existing hardware. It can be a simple box that will suffice while you resolve the problems with the original server.

Pat Richard, MCSE MCSA:Messaging CNA
Want to know how email works? Read for yourself -

http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2821.txt

 

[Marcs41]

If you want a practical solution AND you want it cheap, you WILL need to make some sacrifices, no way around that.

Get any mailserver as a temp. fallback, as that is what it is, TEMPORARY! If during the downtime of the 'real' server they cannot live without the Global list, they will need to come up with the budget to get it right. There are no cheap solutions to any of this in any other way.

Marc
[sub]If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC![/sub]