Exchange 2007: Beginnings

Just to update you on what is keeping me busy. We have our new server and I am working at getting Exchange 2007 installed.

So far it has been pretty straightforward. In theory Exchange 2007 implementation is anticlimactic because there are wizards that do all of the installation tasks for you. So if you can read and install software in a windows environment it should be a snap getting MS Exchange 2007 loaded.

I did have a few issues getting the domain prepared for Exchange. Currently we have a Windows Server 2000 box running Exchange 2003. That machine use be the "everything server" here at CCC which really means he used to do everything.
Here is a list that this server did at one time or another...

• Exchange
• File share
• The only Domain Controller (for 100+ users)
  (which would include all of the FSMO roles)
• DHCP
• DNS
  (inluding WINS)
• Certificate Server
• IIS for Outlook Web Access

Call me crazy or "old school" but I think that is a lot to expect from a server so we have slowly been moving roles off of this workhorse to other hardware.

Here is where thing went a little rough for us.
Exchange 2007 updates the Active Directory Schema and it cannot have an Domain Controllers that are older than Server 2003. This forced me to demote our current server that had exchange on it. Scary! As it turns out she also was the primary DNS Server. After the demotion this server had nothing in DNS and on one could get any where. It took me quite a while to figure out why mail wasn't routing and people could neither get on the internet nor get to their mailboxes. It took a while to get everyone's DHCP changes updated and then there were the static addresses.

My motto is...
All in the name of progress.

The best part is that if everything else goes right no one should notice.

I will, however, notice many benefits for the upgrade.

• Most importantly: hardware that is under warranty and in good working condition
• The hardware is wicked fast (2 - Dual Core Opteron x64 Processors w/ 6GB RAM)
  
• the Exchange 2007 management has simplified many of the views for administration tasks
• All this server will do is be a DC and run Exchange.

It is all simply magic. Now all I have to do is get everyone's mailboxes over to the new server and make sure that BES 4.0 is working with Ex07 since it is not officially recommended.