Server Rebuild Question

Oh man! Ad-blocking software has been detected! :'(

This website is run by the community, for the community... and it needs advertisements in order to keep running. Blocking our ads means your killing our stats!
Please disable your ad-block, or become a premium member to hide all advertisements and this notice.

I would do it on site just in case, I think it would take a day maybe two depending on any dramas.

 

Oh man! Ad-blocking software has been detected! :'(

This website is run by the community, for the community... and it needs advertisements in order to keep running. Blocking our ads means your killing our stats!
Please disable your ad-block, or become a premium member to hide all advertisements and this notice.

Sounds good, best wishes

 

If it's a simple Exchange problem, why don't you pull all traces of Exchange out of AD and reinstall? (re-run forestprep, domainprep etc). I've done that on a couple of occasions to resolve nagging problems with Exchange that remained even after a reinstall - one of them was the result of a failed previous removal and required me to sod around in ADSIEdit removing metadata - but even that wasn't a particularly laborious process.

Obviously you'll need to exmerge everything out first (and believe me, that can take some time and a huge amount of space if the duplication of large mails in user mailboxes ('funny' videos & crud like that) is extensive). It might be worth you getting them to export to pst from Outlook first - I find it's faster doing it that way than running exmerge and, depending on the size of the mailboxes, providing they're not still running Outlook 2000 you can get round having to exmerge within a date range to overcome the 2gb/16383 unicode pst limit.

The approach you're taking (just trying to sort out Exchange rather than carpet bombing the lot) is certainly the way to go. I agree with Simon - take VMWare server and converter with you and run a P2V of the DC first. That way you'll always have something to fall back on if something goes drastically wrong (hardware failure or something daft).

 

Craigie,

Cant see anywhere that you have mentioned the amount of data that the server actually holds, but would it be possible to convert the physical to a vm before you do anything serious then at least you would have a box to seize the roles from and also something (albeit much slower) something for people to log onto should it take longer than anticipated.

Obviously not good if there TB's of data, but just a thought if its just a few docs and most emails are kept on local pst's or summint!

If you do think about this then remember than when p2ving the vm has effectively new network cards so you'll need to make notes of the IP's and dns suffix's etc if they are set beforehand.

edit: bugger sorry forget the above!

 

Cheers for the feedback everyone, I think I'm going to role with the following plan (if management agrees).

- VMware Convertor to PTV.
- Test in Lab removing Exchange 2003 and reinstalling (not worried about the mailboxes, I will just disconnect and delete them all)
- Reinstall Exchange and see if I can get SP2 to stick.

If this works without to many dramas, I will do it for real

 

I'm currently making a test environment before I even do the VMware convertor.

Lashing Server 2003 Enterprise Edition, with Exchange 2003 Enterprise Edition on it, then I will bak it up and then uninstall the bugger.

My concern at the moment after having viewed numerous removal guides is Reciepent Update Service.

Does anyone have any links they would recommend using.

 

Think I have found the answer with ADSIEdit:

3.You will not be able to delete the Recipient Update Service (Enterprise Configuration) by using Exchange 2003 or Exchange 2000 System Manager. Perform the following steps to delete the Recipient Update Service (Enterprise Configuration) by using ADSI Edit (AdsiEdit.msc):

a.Open ADSI Edit, expand Configuration, expand CN=Configuration,CN=<domain>, expand CN=Services, expand CN=Microsoft Exchange, expand CN=<Exchange organization name>, expand CN=Address Lists Container, and then select CN=Recipient Update Services.

b.In the result pane, right-click Recipient Update Service (Enterprise Configuration), click Delete, and then click Yes to confirm the deletion.

From http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb288905(EXCHG.80).aspx

 

Bad news I'm afraid, it's going to be a server rebuild.

The old IT Company had integrated some of there AD and Exchange into the server!

There are actually 3 Servers in Exchange which is wierd, so I have started the prep for this.

- Current configuration documented including AD, Shares, Server Roles, Printers, Licenses, Group Policy, Login Scripts.
- All media and drivers obtained.

The plan is going to be as follows

Pre Migration

- Establish Third Party Apps, support details for Configuration, Backup & Restore
- Cutomer to review AD & Mailboxes
- VMware Physical To Virtual Conversion
- Always Synch Data Shares onto External USB Hard Drive
- Printer MAC Addresses & Drivers

Migration

- Re Run Always Synch Shares Onto External USB Hard Drive
- Confirm Mailbox & Public Folders Exported
- Wipe, Recreate RAID1 & RAID 5 Array, iLO,
- HP Smart Start CD, Server 2003 R2 Standard 32Bit
- Application, AD, DNS, DHCP, File Server, Print Server, RRAS
- Exchange 2003 Standard SP2 Installation & Configuration
- Create Shares Always Synch Data
- Create AD Users, Contacts, Distribution & Security Groups
- Import Mailboxes & Public Folders
- Configure APC Network Shutdown
- Third Party Application Installations & Restore
- Configure Login Scripts
- Rejoin PC’s To Domain & Test
- Printer Installation
- Group Policy
- Network Documentation

It's going to be along weekend, but in the words of Andy McNab 'Pi*s Poor Preparaton Lead to Pi*s Poor Performance'

 

How did it go, or going should I say mate?

 

Yeah - tell us how it's going Craigie - hope you've not run into any problems. My weekend's been light for once - troubleshooting an ESX host with storage issues which only took a couple of hours and an Exchange 2007 install for a private firm with ten users - who didn't have an Exchange environment beforehand so all nice and quick. Wish all my weekends were like this!

 

Oops sorry chaps, the rebuild is this weekend.

 

Fingers crossed

 

Just found out some more bad news 30 clients to rejoin back to the domain and they have lots of users in Thailand, which I have a conference call about tomorrow

Done as much planning as I can now, we will have a full VM image, also I will just be lashing in new hard drives so have the old ones if it all goes tits up.

I will even be using dsadd to recreate all the users and with profile paths etc, thats how concerned I am about time on this project.

On a different note, work have just informed me that a client who has 16 sites, 1 of those 16 sites is movoing locations. There IT will take care of the actual move of all the hardware. But I'm the man to configure all the routing and VPN tunnels on the new site and put all the VPN tunnels inplace back to the other 16 sites on Cisco PIX's and Routers.

See after 20 months in IT you can have responsibility upto your eyeballs.

I think studying is going to take a back burner for a while, as it's time to continue getting balls deep!

 

Craigie, I am really impressed! With only 20 months of experience and already you're doing all that! that's some serious talent you got got for IT. I can tell from experience and just becoming a network admin, it isn't easy to grasp everything, sometimes you gotta take a step back and re-learn. But good job non the less!

 

Well done Craigie! Best of luck with it all mate.

 

Things have been crazy, hear is the short story of events.

Cancelled the rebuild for weekend 13th March and did it this weekend as we didn't get a successful backup.

Friday

- Acronis backup made
- Shared Data exported using Always Synch
- Mailboxes exported using Exmerge
- Public folders exported
- AD Manager Plus used to export AD Settings

Saturday

- Wiped server
- RAID 1 & 5 configured
- APC installed and configured (wasnt even plugged in)
- iLO installed and configured (wasnt even plugged in).
- Server 2003 installed, AD, DNS, File, Print, Application, Exchange configured
- Mailflow tested, OWA, users imported using DSADD
- 40 user accounts in Far East POP email tested and working.
- Imported Mailboxes & Public Folders manually
- Imported Data Shares

Sunday

- Rejoined 27 workstations back to the domain, configured emails and profiles (same icons etc so no user difference).
- Configured photocopiers/printers.
- Login scripts for different departments
- Active Directory structure, Security Groupd, Distribution Groups & Contacts
- VLAN'd phone system (wasn't expecting this)
- Configured and checked third party apps working.
- Network Documentation & Visio Diagrams

30 users into the building this morning and a further 40 in Thailand, everyones working. Only thing that went slightly wrong is some blokes emails here corrupted, I did a manul export from Outlook and also edb and its fecked.

This coming weekend I'm in Wales doing another Cisco line migration which effects 19 sites, happy days.

 

Wow, that's awesome - well done!

Mail flowing now?

Which part of wales mate?