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Need assistance or advice on recommended Exchange 2007 architecture for upgrade
We currently have a single Windows 2003 server install for Exchange 2003. We use a separate ISA 2004 box on the perimeter for the SMTP host. I need some assistance or advice/recommendation on which direction to go for our upgrade to Exchange 2007. We have approximately 300-400 mailboxes, divided over 3 different mailstores. We are licensed for the Enterprise Edition.
Initial reading led me to think I would try the CCR flavor with 2 clustered Server 2008 boxes and continue to use ISA on the perimeter in place of an Edge server role, however I just recently discovered that if using clustering that the clustered boxes can only have the mailbox role installed, therefore I would then need at least 1 more server to contain the CAS and HUB roles. Now I'm looking at 4 servers total involved in messaging and the only redundancy is on the actual database server.
I need some advice here. If I don't cluster the mailbox server and install the mailbox, cas and hub roles all on the same box what type of fail safe measure can I implement? Can I still get some redundancy out of this setup? There is just so much literature out there for Ex2007 I'm getting overwhelmed reading all of these different scenarious.
Initial reading led me to think I would try the CCR flavor with 2 clustered Server 2008 boxes and continue to use ISA on the perimeter in place of an Edge server role, however I just recently discovered that if using clustering that the clustered boxes can only have the mailbox role installed, therefore I would then need at least 1 more server to contain the CAS and HUB roles. Now I'm looking at 4 servers total involved in messaging and the only redundancy is on the actual database server.
I need some advice here. If I don't cluster the mailbox server and install the mailbox, cas and hub roles all on the same box what type of fail safe measure can I implement? Can I still get some redundancy out of this setup? There is just so much literature out there for Ex2007 I'm getting overwhelmed reading all of these different scenarious.
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That's a basic configuration. However, it was my understanding that you can install the necessary roles on the two mailservers and the third system was the failover monitor. This provides redundancy for the entire exchange organization. However, I may be wrong in the detailed information. Check this out and see if this helps you out a bit.
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124521.aspx
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124521.aspx
ASKER
I need someone to confirm whether or not I can have the CAS or HT roles installed on the same box as the Mailbox role if the mailbox setup will be 2 clustered 2008 servers running in CCR? I have heard that only mailbox servers can be clustered and that if running CCR these other roles need to be on other servers. I cannot find the documentation to confirm this.
Try this
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb738150(EXCHG.80).aspx
Should explain how roles are installed.
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb738150(EXCHG.80).aspx
Should explain how roles are installed.
ASKER
Is there a scenario that would include have the CAS, HT and Mailbox roles all on 1 server and having another standby server with all of these roles as well, and both machines synch to keep the same config and data?