Upgrade Exchange 2000 to 2003 by Migration

Current network:

Site 1
3 x Windows 2000 DC (1 running exchange 2000 SP3 Standard)
1 x W2K Member server
1 x W2K3 Member server

Site 2
1 x Windows 2000 DC
3 x W2K Member server (1 running exchange 2000 SP3 Standard)


Site 1 and 2 are on the same domain (we use Linux DNS servers)

The Exchange servers are part of the same admnistrative group with,
   Site 1 Exchange server being a bridgehead server, with a connector scope set for entire organisation and any address space. Site 1 server then forwards all mail through a smarthost in the DMZ that acts as a spam and av scanner as well as the external relay.

I would like to get the existing Site 1 Exchange server onto a member server. I would also like to upgrade the servers to 2003 and the exchange servers to 2003 std as well.

What I plan todo is upgrade the domain to a 2003 mixed mode domain and phase out the 2000 server and rebuild them. But Prior to this I ant to run the 2000/2003 DCS in Mixed mode and migrate the existing exchange servers to 2003.

I plan the 2003 Exchange servers to run alongside the 2000 servers for a short period before the 2000 servers are decommisioned. Apart from things like firewall, DNS. Would there be any problems with adding 2003 servers to our existing Exchange 2000 group and then migrating the email accounts to these new servers using the migration wizard. I planned to add the site 2 Exchange 2003 standard server prior to the rest as the budget has come through for that. I am aware that I will have to reconfigure the connector. Would what I plan to do work? Are there any things I should be aware of?

Thanks

MikeStart Free Trial