Win2k Backup and Exchange

Before I answer your question directly, I would ask why you want to stop and start services? What you should be using is a Backup Agent for Exchange (see your backup system vendor). NTBackup on W2k can also backup Exchange's IS and DS online. If you don't want to buy the agent, you can use NTBackup to backup Exchange to a file, then backup that file with your normal backup system.

However, if you are determined to start/stop services, you can create 2 batch files with the appropriate "netstop" and "net start" commands. One file to stop the services, and one to start them. Plug these batch files into your backup system as a Pre Execution / Post Execution job. Usually there's a place for you to enter a delay time. You want to makesure you give the batch file enough time to stop the services.

One more word of caution: Restoring Exchange with an offline backup can be extremely difficult if you have multiple Exchange servers. Spend the money, buy the agent.

Install Exchange Admin on the backup machine to update ntbackup (this will have hooks to backup Exchange hot). You can then create a batch file to backup Exchange without stopping any services (instead of drive letters in the batch, you'd use the Exchange IS/DS syntax). To set up a cold Exchange backup, create another batch job to stop all Exchange Services first, sleep to make all services are stopped, and use ntbackup to backup all local drives. Order of stopping Exchange services are on MS-KBase.