Upgrade AD/Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2007 on a new hardware

[davy2k]

Hi All,
I have a Domain Controller running Windows 2003 Standard Edition R2 with Exchange 2003 installed on the same hardware, this hardware is about to be retired and we would like to perform the following:

- Move the AD to a new hardware
- Upgrade the Exchange 2003 to 2007 on a new and separate hardware.
without affecting users

Plan:

- Configure the new hardware as an Additional Domain controller
- Replicate the two servers
- Upgrade the Exchange 2003 to 2007 on the new hardware and migrate all users
- De-commission the Exchange 2003
- Delete the old server entry from the new server

Concern:
Clients are using Outlook 2003, will clients be automatically redirected to the new server.

Please any suggestions or links that can assist in performing this tasks smoothly will be welcomed.

Thank you

 

[markdmac]

This may just be an issue of terminology, but you cannot upgrade Exchange 2003 to 2007. On your new hardware which will need to be x64, you will install a fresh copy of 2007 and just point it to the existing Exchange during install. That will let you use the Move Mailbox wizard to migrate your users over to the new system. As long as you do not remove the original Exchange box initially, the Outlook clients will automatically be redirected.

Essentially you don't want to decommission the old Exchange until after all clients have logged in. The clients will contact the old server which will then say "sorry the mailbox was moved to server x" and the clients will update themselves.

Your next step will them be to gracefully uninstall Exchange 2003 and then run DCPROMO on the old DC.

Make sure you follow this guide:

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

I hope you find this post helpful.

Regards,

Mark

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[58sniper]

If it were me, I'd install Hyper-V on the new box, spin up two VMs, and put Exchange on one and the DC on the other. That would allow you to still have both machines on one box, but have the ability of having separate servers to keep things cleaner.

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/