For the past 5-6 days I have been running into problems exceeding the 75gb mailbox store limit on our exchange server. I have been viciously having users remove old e-mail and deleting mailboxes that are no longer used on our server. Can anyone recommend some quick tasks I can perform within the exchange server to purge the data that users have deleted (ie. overriding the retention period) and other management tasks? Exchange is something that our old admin was responsible for so our staff isn't extremely knowledgable yet on the administration of it. Any tips would be greatly appreciated, as I have been having to do a nightly restart of the exchange server to keep the mailbox store alive.
Thanks in advance!
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Yes,
http://support.microsoft.c
Exchange Server 2003 Standard Edition
Exchange 2003 Standard Edition is designed to meet the messaging and collaboration requirements of small and medium corporations and for specific messaging server roles or branch offices.
* One storage group can be created on a server
* One mailbox store database and one public folder store database that can be accessed by using MAPI and Outlook Web Access
* Up to four more public folder store databases that are accessible only programmatically
* Maximum 16-gigabyte (GB) database limit per database (75 GB with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2)
* Exchange clustering is not supported
* X.400 connector is not included
Exchange Server 2003 Enterprise Edition
Exchange 2003 Enterprise Edition is designed for large enterprise corporations. With Exchange 2003 Enterprise Edition, you can create multiple storage groups and multiple databases. Exchange 2003 Enterprise Edition provides an unlimited message store that removes the constraints on how much data a single server can manage.
* Four storage groups
* Five databases per storage group
* 16 terabyte database limit, limited only by hardware
* Exchange clustering is supported
* X.400 connector is included
1. Open the Exchange Management Console.
2. In the console tree, expand Microsoft Exchange, then expand Server Configuration, and then select Mailbox.
3. On the Database Management tab in the work pane, expand the storage group that contains the mailbox database that you want to configure.
4. Right-click the database that you want to configure, and then select Properties.
5. Click the Limits tab.
6. In the Deletion settings area, enter the number of days to retain deleted items in Keep deleted item for (days).
7. Click OK to save the changes.
Exchange 2000/2003 Standard: One storage group with one mailbox store and one public folder store.
from http://articles.techrepubl
Sorry for cause you guys a headache, it's been a nightmare running a one-man Help Desk/Admin show this morning.
Some answers to your questions:
1) I determined our mail store is at 75.5gb because I went into System Manager and exported my mailboxes list to a csv, calculated the total KB used which is 79,256,888 KB, or 75.5GB.
2) I have just set retention to 0 days for deleted items and 0 days for deleted mailboxes... I want everything off ASAP to help free up space. I will restore my retention amount after I can clean up the stores.
-Does this take immediate effect and begin purging? It seems like the store must backup first before it actually deletes the items. I'm assuming I can only do the backup offline.
3) The multiple stores issue: From all of my research, you cannot create another mailbox store in Exchange Standard. I tried to do this and received an error message. Therefore, my conclusion is Exchange Standard's limit is 75gb period.
1) That's ok then. Short term, clean up. Long term, move to Enterprise or Exchange 2007 Standard and create mupltiple storage groups and split your users. The analogy of "Eggs in one basket" would come to mind here
2) Again, sound idea. As your mailbox size comes down in EMC, look at doing an offline defrag to get the physical size down if you need to.
Good URL for you;
http://searchexchange.tech
3) As I said (twice now I believe), its a known limitation with Exchange 2003 Standard. Just as well they removed the 16gb size limit, or you would be well stuffed.
4) If you want, you can restrict mailbox sizes down. If you work out an average (based on 70gb) per user, and specify it slightly lower, they will not be able to exceed that amount.
http://www.computerperform
Thanks djxtreme. I actually implemented mailbox limits a few weeks ago except for managers due to their high volume of e-mail. Looks like I am still going to play the big bad e-mail cop for the rest of the week.
For the retention, it seems that a backup has to occur before these items are actually deleted from the store. (even with 0 days specified). Can I perform a manual backup tonight, or could this be on a schedule that I need to find out?
Again, thank you- you have been a great help.
Archiving?
You could force people to archive, the problem is then is they end up with Gigs of emails stored away, never backed up (or even worse, in their roaming profile)
Nothing beats teaching users how to use email properly, and how to organize their mailbox :)
andlol @ your comment regarding your bottom JoWickerman :)
hehe yes it should :)
Just make sure you do a proper backup, not a "file";
http://www.msexchange.org/
Great. Thanks, so here is my Plan (please comment/criticize)
1. Continue to be e-mail cop and cut down e-mail
2. Perform ntbackup before 12am
3. Let daily maintenance run from 12am-4am which will perform another backup and then an online defrag which should report the space level under 75gb, thus keeping exchange running instead of stopping.
Business Accounts
Answer for Membership
by: djxtremePosted on 2008-12-18 at 03:20:13ID: 23202262
Are your mailboxes actually exceeding 75gb in size?
I usually export the mailbox list to a csv, dump it in Excel and run a total. If it doesn't come to 75gb (or to what the physical size is) you need to run a Offline Defrag.
Copied from MS KB328804
Offline defragmentation
Although online defragmentation provides some additional database space, you must defragment the Exchange database offline to reduce the physical size of the Exchange database. Eseutil is an Exchange utility that you can use to defragment, to repair, and to examine the integrity of Exchange databases. You can use the Eseutil utility (Eseutil.exe) to perform offline defragmentation when your mailbox stores and public folder stores are offline.
For example, you might perform offline defragmentation if you recently moved many users from a server that is running Exchange. In that case, offline defragmentation reduces the size of the Exchange databases by rearranging the data on the server's Exchange databases and discarding any unused database pages.
Note Eseutil is located in the Winnt\System32 folder in Exchange Server 5.5 and in the Exchsrvr/Bin folder in Exchange 2000 and in Exchange 2003.
By default, the Eseutil /d command defragments a database by creating a new database, copying the old database records to the new one, and discarding any unused database pages. This creates a newly organized compact database file.
Use the following database switch to run Eseutil defragmentation on a specific database:
eseutil /d Database_Name [options]
Iwhere Database_Name is the file name of the database that you want to compact.
You can run Eseutil with the /d /p option at the command line to configure Eseutil to create the new defragmented database in a separate location, such as a location on a different hard disk. If you turn off instating, the offline defragmentation process preserves the original database uncompacted, and the temporary file that is created is the defragmented version of the database. For example, you could turn off instating by using the /d /p option. Unlike the standard offline defragmentation process (Eseutil /d), if you run Eseutil with the /d /p option, the original database is not overwritten with the new defragmented database when the offline defragmentation process is completed.
The /d /p option can also significantly reduce the time that is required to defragment large databases because you do not copy the defragmented database from the temporary location and overwrite the original fragmented file. However, if you want to mount the defragmented database after you use this option, you must manually move the defragmented .edb and .stm files into the database path and rename them to the correct database file names.
For example, if Tempdfg.edb and Tempdfg.stm are the defragmented files that you created by running the /d /p option, you must rename them to Priv1.edb and Priv1.stm respectively if Priv1.edb and Priv1.stm are the databases that you originally ran Eseutil against. The following example command defragments a database that is named Mailbox Store.edb and its accompanying streaming file, turns off instating, and creates the defragmented databases on the D drive. Notice that there is no space after /t.
eseutil /d /p "c:\program files\exchsrvr\mdbdata\mai
Note If you do not use the /t option, the Tempdfgxxxx.edb file and the Tempdfgxxxx.stm file are created in the location that you run Eseutil from. In the previous file names, xxxx is a random number.
Additionally, you may want to use the following options when you use Eseutil to defragment the Exchange databases:
Collapse this tableExpand this table
Option Description
/b Database Make a backup copy under the specified name
/tDatabase Set the temporary database name (the default is Tempdfrg.edb)
/sFile Set the streaming file name (the default is NONE)
/fFile Set the temporary streaming file name (the default is Tempdfrg.stm)
/p reserve the temporary database (in other words, do not instate)
P/o Suppress logo
/i Do not defragment streaming file
Note The Tempdfrg.edb file is created on the logical drive where the eseutil /d command is run unless you use the /t switch. For example, to create a Tempdfrg.edb on the root of drive D, run the following command:
D:\>eseutil /d /ispriv
You can also use the /t switch to set the name for the temp database and for a different location. For example, to create a Sample.edb on the root of drive D when you are running the eseutil command from drive C, run the following command:
C:\>eseutil /d /ispriv /td:\Sample.edb
Note If instating is disabled, the original database is preserved uncompacted, and the temporary database contains the defragmented version of the database. For example, instating is disabled when you use the /p option.