Suggestion Required for exchange 2013

what are the current specs ?
you have to:
monitor RAM consumption continuously and add more for better response.
NIC Teaming for load balancing / fail over.
monitor storage status continuously.

Hi ,

The config is:- Intel cpu e5-2620 2 processors with 16gb memory. two partitions . Second partition contains the mail box folder.

I thing NIC teaming is configured in Vmware. But still how can I check that also how to monitor storage status. Please help. As I am totally new to this server world.

Regards,

JCT

please also write a little bit more about operating systems you have..

regarding RAM consumption start task manager in your Exchange VM and in performance tab you will see RAM statistics, try to make 2GB idle for safe side.

and regarding disk capacity you have to monitor Physical DISKS as well as VM's partition where exchange files are supposed to be stored (Mailboxes, etc.).

for NIC teaming check Network Configuration in VMware console.

Hi ,

The OS is Windows server 2012 Standard.

Regards,

JCT

Hi,

In the task manager CPU is showing 10% for 2.00GHZ

Memory showing 15/16GB (94%)

Regards,

JCT

Host and Guest both are on 2012 ?
is there only one VM (Exchange) on host ?
please share VM's specs too.

Hi ,

There are total 4 vm's in this host server. the summary of the host server:- system x3650 12cpusX 1.999GHZ.
Processor sockets=2
Cores per socket=6
no.of NIcs =5
Ram=32gb out of which 26gb is used .
hdd =300gbX2 (only 2 hdd's is installed physically in this server)

Please recommend if I need to upgrade this server or not.
Also how many VM's can I create in one physical server.

Regards,

JCT

Hi ,

So as per your advice I need to add more HDD's to the server. Also i will upgrade the memory. If I upgrade these 2 then there is not to worry. What if i need to upgrade the San Storage.

Regards,

JCT

no need to upgrade physical RAMs, but you must increase Exchange's RAM to 1GB for now as we can see 94% is already consumed..make at least 2GB free in exchange in future also.

are those 300GB are on Raid 1 or Raid 0 ?

Hi,

In the beginning the server was configured by another Engineer. I think its Raid 1.

Is it good if i increase the Ram along with the HDD.  Also there is currently 2 hdd with 300gb each . If I purchase 2 more HDD do I need to configure raid 5 or will it take it automatically i.e. Raid 1.

Regards,

JCT

Hi ,

As per your advice i have increased the memory to 20gb for the exchange server . Now it shows 41% used.

Regards,

JCT

you can add RAMs but this process wants system shutdown.

nothing in RAID will configure automatically after adding HDDs. You have to configure it after adding disks.
you have to add three HDDs and configure your RAID with new Virtual Disk.
"DO NOT TOUCH CURRENT/EXISTING VIRTUAL DISK" in which two HDDs are populated RAID configuration.
Create new Virtual Disk and add those three new HDDs in it then select RAID LEVEL 5 and quit with initialize disks. Once initializing completes, reboot and let server boot.
In server manager you have to format that partition which you created and then you have to shutdown VMs one by one and copy all of the VHDs and files into new partition and start VMs from new location.
you have your OS in previous 2 HDDs so please DO not touch your previous drives or virtual disk in raid.
after adding new HHDs and testing them, we will add those 2 HDDs too with the new configuration.

Hi ,

I will better ask the supplier to install the new hdd's.  Is it possible to move the mailbox folder to another storage. I mean a NAS Storage.  

Regards,

JCT

Hi ,

Just a doubt. As I have already mentioned its a VMWare environment. Do I need to increase the HDD of the host server or do I need to increase the HDD of the San Storage.

Because the drive space I am getting from the Storage

Regards,

JCT

There are a lot of open ended questions in there.
A lot depends on the usage.
The server cpu, ram and storage are relatively easy to monitor and upgrade as you see fit.
More and faster will never go astray.
Bandwidth of getting the data in and out of the server can be important, especially as more people send large attachments.

However - there is no mention of your backup/recovery plans. Exchange is one big data file that can take a long time to repair/recover if it screws up. Also, users will regularly delete mail that you will need to recover, sometimes accidentally, other times maliciously. Your strategies for these things can easily be more important than performance.

Hi ,

For the backup we are using BackupExec. All the backups are going to our SAN Storage i.e. IBM. Till now I didn't faced any issue. All is working fine. My exchange server 2013 standard is installed in one server only.

Regards,

JCT

Hi,

As I have mentioned above its an Virtual environment. All the servers are clustered through vmware software. Even if any severs are down there shall be no downtime. there may be slowness in the network.  My plan is to configre a NAS storage for database in exchange server & move all the old dbs to the new one. Is it a correct method of doing that ??

Regards,

JCT

Wait, now the VMware is clustered? This is new information.

On what kind of storage is the Exchange DBs on? How is it bring presented to the VM?
Why do you feel that the Exchange DBs need to be moved?

Be aware that Microsoft doesn't support running Exchange storage over NAS protocols (NFS). There is scepticism in the industry that it is an actual problem,  but Microsoft doesn't support it. They only support block storage for Exchange (local disk, iSCSI, FC).

Hi ,

Presently we have San Storage of the IBM. The place is getting less in that. If we purchase a new San Storage can we mount it to the exchange server as a database.

Regards,

JCT

Dear Experts,

As I am totally new to the server side so before implementing anything first i take the advice of  the experts. The advice I got from the experts was really good.  

Regards,

JCT