Setting up a backup Exchange Server 2007

[starbrad]

Hello,

I am currently setting up a brand new Exchange 2007 environment and was wondering if anyone had any insight into setting up a backup exchange server offsite. I have one server setup and active, running as a hub/transport server. What I would like to do is have another server setup (identical), only offsite in a passive mode, and if the active server fails, the passive server can just be kicked online and take over as the email server. Is there an easy way to do this without any external/third party replication software? Thanks.

 

[58sniper]

That's not how the HT role works. The HT role is naturally load balancing when in the same AD site. In different sites, you can configure routing based on AD site replication topology. This would provide some mail routing if another HT server went down.

It's common to put both the CAS and HT roles on two identical servers, and then use NLB for the CAS pieces and some of the HT pieces.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[ShackDaddy]

Starbrad, you just have a single server, right? And it also has the mailbox role on it, right? Are you trying to make sure that your mailbox server is still available to connect to from outside clients if your primary goes down?

You may want to be investigating SCR clusters.

Dave Shackelford
ThirdTier.net

 

[starbrad]

Hey Dave,

Yes, I just have a single server with the mailbox role installed on it. The email server is only internal, there are no external clients connecting. I would like to have a backup server offsite, and that way if the primary mail server goes down, the offsite server can be brought online with minimal disruption to email flow. That's what I've been looking into, setting up SCR with the two boxes. I'm in the middle of a couple of VM's to test the replication between the two.

Brad

 

[Zelandakh]

It isn't replication between the 2, it is log shipping from one to the other.

 

[starbrad]

Ok, so I did some testing with SCR and got the log shipping working between both servers, however I'm not sure if this is going to work for my purpose. As explained, essentially what I would like to do is have one primary server onsite that is the Hub Transport, Client Access and Mailbox Role Server. All the clients would retrieve there email from this server, and during the evenings the log shipping or a backup would transfer all the new data to a server sitting offsite (connected though through static VPN tunnel).

If for some reason the primary server goes down completely, I would like to bring the backup server online with the most recent data, point the MX records to the backup server, and have it operate just like the primary server would (with teh hub transport, client access and mailbox roles), with minimal disruption to the end users.

From what I've tested with the Standby Continuous Replication, it doesn't seem to do that, unless i'm doing something wrong. Does anyone have any examples or steps that I can go through to set this scenario up? Or is a third party backup software needed? Thanks much for the help.

Brad

 

[58sniper]

There is a lot more to DR planning than just bringing up an SCR box. You have to think about routing of SMTP traffic when you move to the SCR target. You have to worry about authentication traffic for the SCR box.

Also - you don't want data copied at a specific time each day. You want it always replicating.

Keep in mind that SCR isn't meant for high availability. That's what CCR for mailbox and NLB for HT and CAS are for. SCR is meant for site resiliency - like when your primary site becomes a smoking hole in the ground.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[starbrad]

Thanks Pat, appreciate the information. One question though, when you state that SCR is meant for site resiliency, that is exactly what I would like to setup. Basically, if our primary site, burns to the ground, being able to get exchange up and running with minimal downtime. On our offsite location, there is already a DC setup for authentication, and I control the DNS, so the MX records can be pointed to that IP, as well as another configuration setup for the router on location to route mail traffic.

For setting up this SCR scenario, is it possible to do it with just 2 servers, one at each location (if the 1st server goes down, the second server is able to handle everything)? Thanks.

Brad

 

[Zelandakh]

Sounds like you need CCR with the MX record set to both, one with a priority 5, one with 10. That would achieve what you want, fully automatically.