Ive got a test domain set of for this exchange cluster stuff and im fairly new to all this. we currently have 2 exchange servers with a san in place. my question is how do we get the outbound mail working? right now the inbound mail works good but i cant send to a yahoo account or anything. i remember reading somewhere that you can't have the cluster as the front-end exchange server. if thats the case how would u make a front end to forward to the cluster. right now ive installed 3 NICs in each node. internal, external, heartbeat. the resource show up fine in cluster admin. i look in the email queue in the exchange server and the test msgs are not being sent. im not sure what to do next. windows 2003 server is my OS and im using exchange 2003 both with sp2. any help would be great thx
My question is how do we get the outbound mail working? right now the inbound mail works good but i cant send to a yahoo account or anything. Having three NICs on each node complicates things a bit since you need a default gateway to route mail properly. Having multiple gateways on different NICs usually causes routing problems. Can you configure your Exchange with one Public and one Heartbeat and have a router/firewall take care of routing to the outside world? Otherwise you'll have to setup route statements to ensure the cluster's NICs can route properly.
i remember reading somewhere that you can't have the cluster as the front-end exchange server. if thats the case how would u make a front end to forward to the cluster. The front-end server you refer to is an Exchange configuration that allows an Exchange server to take care of OWA, encryption and authentation and route requests to a back-end server were the mailboxes reside. This doesn't apply to your cluster.
Well considering our network layout i dont think this is possible. we need one for internal as well so exchange can communicate with our domain. how would i go about doing these routing statements? All this seems kinda complicated. is this the normal way an organization sets up an exchange cluster?
I totally agree with Paka Thats not the way, I have set up exchange clusters in the past.You just need 2 NIC's one for heart beat and other for communicating with the LAN. Exchange front end server is not a must for you to send external emails.You can run just a external cluster with proper SMTP connectors to send emals externally. I sugest you to download the white papers about how to setup clusters.It will guide you through set by step.
alright i knew i was doing something wrong.. ill disable the 3rd NIC.....ive got the the cluster working...i followed directions from a document. the internal mail works, failover works. I have this test enviroment set up with a linksys 8-port workgroup switch model# EZX588W. im starting to think this switch is not gonna do the job for me....so i have to modify settings in switch to route the smtp requests?
I don't under stand what you mean by Workgroup switch never heard about that.If this switch is plugged to the core which which is probably connected to your firewall or router you should be fine.You don't need to change the switch. Setup the SMTp conenctorto send emails externally.
I dont understand what you mean "the core" the switch is the only thing plugged into these devices in my mini test enviroment(besides the heartbeat). Now with that being said i wanted to add an external connection so i can send mail to a yahoo account for example. Now, i tried adding a 3rd NIC to bring an internet connection to my nodes and you guys said that wont work, so ive disabled that. My internet connection comes threw fibre channel to a pix firewall and from there goes to a switch. So if you consider the main switch the core your sayin i should plug in my switch to that?
Yeah you got it right you need to plug in the Cluster switch to the mail switch for external email.I hope you are not using seperate subnets for your Cluster switch and mail switch if so than you need some sort of routes enabled on your main switch.
