What is the general opinion... Should we upgrade or migrate from 5.5 to 2003? Has anyone encountered any major issues with either option? (one org, one site, no connectors, 4 servers)
Advice appreciated. Thanks.
Actually you can do both but I highly recommend to migrate as xmsre mentions.
In-place upgrade takes actually a lot of steps. I assume you have NT4/E55:
1. upgrade to W2K/E55 (if you're coming from NT4/E55)
2. upgrade to W2K/E2K
3. upgrade to W2K/E2K3 (you can't upgrade from E55 to E2K3)
4. upgrade to W2K3/E2K3 (if you want E2K3 running on W2K3)
Migration is very wizard based so actually it's more like next next next finish. Be sure to have the LDAP connector on E55 enabled (I didn't have it enabled at a customer). And for your own ease join E2K3 to your E55 site.
quick tip with public folders if you use the migration wizard. Rather than go through the migration process with all the commands. Just copy all the public folders into a mailbox and then back. It should keeps all the permissions as well.
3800 users and 100gb of mail is a faily small migration. If you size it right, you'll only need one backend mailbox server or possibly a cluster. If you're a heavy OWA user, you may want to go a FE/BE design.
*BONUS: Unlike E2K, E2K3 standard can be a front end server.
I'd just add the new E2k3 mailbox server to the existing site, move the mailboxes, then back 5.5 out. I've found you can get 3 or 4 sessions of the move mailbox wizard on different workstations all moving mail at the same time to speed it up.
*WARNING: No matter which way you move the mail, when you stuff it into the new server you'll generate some serious log files; about 100gb. Your choices are to turn on circular logging for the duration of the mailbox moves, or stop frequently and perform a full online backup to truncate the logs.
Hello,
Just want to get things clear from you all before migrating my exch. 5.5. Here is what I have:
1. W2K domain - mixed mode (NT)
2. One E5.5 runs on W2K
Plan:
- Make the domain become 2K native mode
- Install W2K3 server and join to the domain
- Install E2K3 on top of the W2K3 server and join to the E5.5 site
- Move all the mailboxes and public folder from E5.5
Will this scenario will work successfully? Any sugestion on what literature that assists this migration.
Great thread. Here's an irritation of mine..What if you can't install E2K or E2K3 into the E55 site due to poorly named E55 org with incompatible characters? Would you recommend changing org name per Q158028 or installing new and exporting mailboxes with exmerge?
What is the affect on clients configs for both scenarios?
I would migrate to a new org via exmerge. The drawback is you lose a things.
1. Rules
2. Replies to old emails [those sent prior to the migration] will bounce unless you add a custom X500 address to each recipient that matches the old E55 DN. You can do this by hand or by script.
Another issue is that the clients will be unable to redirect. You'll have to push changes to Outlook profiles on client desktops.
The problem comes in two parts. In the first part, the client needs a way to find out where the mailbox has been moved to. There are at least two ways to do this. One way, if you're migrating entire servers all at once, is to take down the old server and put a CMANE record in DNS that points to the new server. The client will then be able to resolve the mailbox. If you're migrating batches of users, then you need a way to incrementally move the users. You can push changes to the outlook profile of the migrated users though custom adm teplate and a GPO, the use of an outlook.prf file and the modprof utility, or a variety of 3rd party utilities like O'Profile and so forth. If you use a GPO, you can make it apply only to a specific group by setting the security on it. This way, you can add the members to the group as you migrate thier mailboxes, and have the changes to the profiles happen automagically.
The second half of the problem deals with "check name". When you Exmerge a mailbox, the client profile still constains a reference to their contacts folder on the old server. This reference, or PR_ENTRYID, is a data stucture the contents of which is unique for the folder. This is why clients tend to hang after an Exmerge. You can manually remove the OAB, or Outlook Address Book service from the client profile. This removes the entry that contains the reference to the old contacts folder. Then, when you add the OAB back to the client profile, it copies a reference to the contacts folder on the new server to the client profile. Having 3000 to 300,000 or so users manually remove and add the OAB service from thier profile tends to generate a few calls to the helpdesk, so perhaps an automated approach would be better. At one point MCS wrote a little utility called Clprflpr that you could push out through a logon script to fix the reference in the client's mapi profile. If you called M$ PSS and asked for it, you could probably get it. I think it was also either on one of the MEC conference CDs or a TechED CD. In any event, it would be faily simple to create a utility that either automates removing and adding the OAB service or one that otherwise patches up the reference to the contacts folder in the client profile. A script or even an executable can be packaged and pushed as a software distribution GPO and assigned to the user. A software distribution GPO can also filter by group through setting the security on it.
No, you don't have to upgrade your domain to W2K3 to use E2K3 (so E2K3 on W2K3 is fine). It's just that you need an AD domain in order to install E2K or E2K3.
I highly discourage you to install a DC on your Exchange box. This can lead to many problems when a hacker breaks your Exchange server. From a technical point of view there's no problem, from a security point of view there sure is!!
Upgrading to a W2K3 DC (I mean all your W2K DCs). Hmmm, W2K3 domain has several improvements on W2K but as from an Exchange perspective I don't know of much (any?) added features. You will have E2K3 on a W2K3 member server so one of the very nice thingies you can use is volume shadow copy. But then you don't need a W2K3 domain.
Anyone else who can see a clear added value of W2K3 domain over W2K from an Exchange perspective?
THe only this that i could see as being an advantage is the shadowcopy feature but in reality there are none, i did the change over myself and have found no extra or benefitial features justifying the cost.
There is another advantage for Exchange2003 on Windows2003 having to do with RPC-over-HTTP. But this does not require a Windows2003 domain. There are many differences. Here is a link:
thanks for all ur helpful suggestions ,
plz explain me in a bit detail or specify the steps that i should fowllow in migrating to 2003.........if u guys can spare ur precious time in explaining me......i have gone through many articles but its all confusing....
Thanks everyone this has been very useful - a question in response to BEBOEN reply... Can you confirm that to install E2K3 be it on W2K or W2K3 - it must be an active directory domain?
So this means I would need to upgrade my NT4 domain to W2K domain (mixed mode) in order to proceed with a migration to E2K3?
Beboen, you're a star - is it possible to create a new W2K3 domain (as opposed to an inplace upgrade) with a trust to NT4 domain. Install new E2K3 server joining the 5.5 site on NT4 domain??? Please please say it is....... !!
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