Exchange stopped working after uninstalling Forefront for Exchange on SBS 2008
Windows SBS 2008 with Exchange 2007. We have just come on as the IT for a small company and they have been hammered with email issues. Found that thier Forefront for Exchange which has been expired since 2015 was blocking a lot of email with attachments to only specific users.
Did some research and spoke with a tech from Microsoft and was recommended to uninstall Forefront for Exchange but only after stopping all Exchange services first. That was completed and the server was running fine.
This morning Exchange is not working, services are just hanging and no mail is flowing as the Store service is not running.
Attempted to reinstall Forefront and the installation just hangs at Preparing Installation and eventually will fail is you wait long enough.
So I decided to just restore the server to yesterdays backup before any changes were made however now I am getting an error from the Windows Server Recovery of Error code 0x80070057; "the parameter is incorrect"
Any help is much appreciated.
Since this OS is EOL and Exchagne is as well I may have to resort to the $499 Microsoft call. Hope you all can assist.
Did some research and spoke with a tech from Microsoft and was recommended to uninstall Forefront for Exchange but only after stopping all Exchange services first. That was completed and the server was running fine.
This morning Exchange is not working, services are just hanging and no mail is flowing as the Store service is not running.
Attempted to reinstall Forefront and the installation just hangs at Preparing Installation and eventually will fail is you wait long enough.
So I decided to just restore the server to yesterdays backup before any changes were made however now I am getting an error from the Windows Server Recovery of Error code 0x80070057; "the parameter is incorrect"
Any help is much appreciated.
Since this OS is EOL and Exchagne is as well I may have to resort to the $499 Microsoft call. Hope you all can assist.
Generally, you can just run fscutility /disable command to disable Forefront. Check Exchange related services, if all services are running. Also check Application and system logs.
ASKER
Microsoft got on the line with us today and repaired Exchange. As for the reason the restore didn't work was related to the USB and Windows Recovery that we were using to boot SBS2008 from. In an attempt to just recover from the previous nights image which is on a separate external USB HDD.
As for the fix we went through about 23 different settings within Exchange, services and registry keys. Apparently Forefront f'd up exchange pretty good but was workable somehow...
Fluke event happened at 3am, (alerts blowing up my phone) power supply fan blew a bearing and caught the blade or slowed it down enough that it over heated the PSU or server causing it to reboot unexpectedly and that set the wheels in motion for disaster. Got onsite only to hear the blade ting, ting, rapidly.
This is what happens when you try to stretch the life of a server well past its service life. Software becomes outdated, then compatibility gaps grow. Once that happens you make changes to make things work which increases chances for failure. Lesson learned and they are pulling the trigger on a new server that we have been proposing for a few months.
As for the fix we went through about 23 different settings within Exchange, services and registry keys. Apparently Forefront f'd up exchange pretty good but was workable somehow...
Fluke event happened at 3am, (alerts blowing up my phone) power supply fan blew a bearing and caught the blade or slowed it down enough that it over heated the PSU or server causing it to reboot unexpectedly and that set the wheels in motion for disaster. Got onsite only to hear the blade ting, ting, rapidly.
This is what happens when you try to stretch the life of a server well past its service life. Software becomes outdated, then compatibility gaps grow. Once that happens you make changes to make things work which increases chances for failure. Lesson learned and they are pulling the trigger on a new server that we have been proposing for a few months.
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Did you integrate Transport service with Forefront?