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Moving Exchange Server 2000 to New Box

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Hi All,
I work for a small company and we’ve been using Exchange 2000 for quite awhile on a small server. I’ve recently purchased a new faster box with raid support and would like to move my Exchange server from one box to the other. Since the boxes are configured so differently, I can’t just clone the drive. Can you offer some suggestions on what steps I should take to do this without losing everything I’ve got? The last time we moved mail servers (on Exch. 5.5), the securities got screwed up and we had to start fresh from scratch, a major nightmare that I’d like to avoid if possible. I’m sure there must be an easier way. I know it’s possible to have two servers in the organization and move boxes between them, but I’m not sure if configuring such a set up for such a short period of time would be worth is, since once I move the 50 or so boxes off the server it will be removed from service. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks again…

Topic

Moving the server

In reply to Moving Exchange Server 2000 to New Box

Hiya, in your setup, personally I would add the new server into the organisation and move the mailboxes, it very straight forward using this method, and allows you to clean up anything that may be wrong with your installation.

Adding another exchange server

In reply to Moving the server

That seems to be what most of what I read says. I’m just concerned about removing the original server once I’ve moved my boxes. I’m worried that it would still be considered the primary mail server and that mail would stop flowing. Guess I’ve got some reading to do..

Been there

In reply to Moving Exchange Server 2000 to New Box

I just finished that task. I followed the procedure here and it worked without a hitch.

I setup a new Exchange Server, joined the domain, then do this as documented.

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=307917

Good Luck!

Moved mine 2 weeks ago!

In reply to Moving Exchange Server 2000 to New Box

I moved my E2k from old server to new server a couple weeks ago. In addition to all the stuff in the KB article 307917, I also had to tell my new server to be the Global catalog server. That was located in the AD Sites & Services, see MS article #295419. I also had to move the global addressbook, which (I think) was also under sites & services.

MS calls it “rehoming” files and you will have to do it for all the public files that ‘live’ on your old exchange server. do a search on their site for rehome exchange if you have problems.

I do know that once you have followed the steps and THINK you have everything moved, you have to take a deep breath (say a prayer) and then insert the exchange cd and uninstall it, with the server still plugged into the network. Then, after restarting, if your phone is not ringing, unplug the patch cable from old server and see what happens. You’ll probably need to close and reopen outlook and see if it is “waiting for response from “. If so, put the network cable back in and see what else needs to be moved.

Learning all this cost me $245 for a call to MS, so hopefully it will save you that! 🙂

Good luck!!!!!

And….

In reply to Moved mine 2 weeks ago!

After you think you have it all done….wait a couple of weeks for any replication to take place and for all of your users to have an opportunity to log on and be redirected to the new server. Then uplug it.

Good luck!

and if it was also a domain controller…

In reply to Moving Exchange Server 2000 to New Box

then you also need to remove AD from the old mail server, else you have all these mysterious replication things happening that are not easy to kill.
I just learned this last week. 🙂

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