Thoughts on old mailboxes

Our Environ is a Windows 2012 R2 domain, 2008 FFL/DFL and we have exchange 2013.

When a user leaves, we of course disable them in AD.  I know we still have to disable them in Exchange as well, but when disabled, the user still shows in the GAL.  

I'm wondering about the possibility of creating a new DB named archive and migrating my disabled users there versus exporting to .pst and saving.

What are your thoughts on that?  Just migrating disabled users to another DB?

Thanks

Cliff
crp0499CEOAsked:
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Satyendra SharmaMicrosoft UC Technical ArchitectCommented:
Is your concern just that they are still visible in the GAL?

Why don't you disable the mailbox and select the option to hide it from the GAL so that it won't appear in the Address list. You can also get creative and script it to find all the disabled AD account and then disable the corresponding mailbox as well as mark to hide from gal.

Set-Mailbox -Identity <alias> -HiddenFromAddressListEnabled $true
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AmitIT ArchitectCommented:
Here what I suggest. You Create one new mailbox name it as per your company naming convention. Then whenever users leave, you use PS command and merge data into this new mailbox with a target folder. Target folder name need to be user name. Hide this new mailbox from GAL. Once data is exported you remove old mailbox. This way you will have all data in your Exchange server. Let me know, if you need PS command to export.
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crp0499CEOAuthor Commented:
well, not just to hide from GAL.  We need to keep them for a few weeks after they leave as well.  I was thinking if I moved (migrated) them to a different DB, I could kill two birds with one stone:  I would removed them from the GAL and archive the mailbox.
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crp0499CEOAuthor Commented:
AMIT, I like that idea.  So I would have one large mailbox with archived user data stored in target folders?  Yes?
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AmitIT ArchitectCommented:
Yes, that correct. Keep adding new users into new target folder. You can say that as master mailbox under that you will have data for each user in separate folder. Say, User1, User2 etc.

Easy to maintain and access, whenever required. Secondly, data will on Exchange and will be backed up. As you are not using it, it won't generate any load on Exchange server. Let it go, as large as much. However you can decide when you want to create Master 2.
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