Exchange Store to External Drive

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shakes1

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Hi all

I have a friend who is rapidly running out of space on his MS Exchange server. They are on a RAID 1 config, so adding a new drive is not going to help.

He has this idea of moving his exchange store onto an external hard drive, that has a lot more space, as a temporary measure for a few weeks.

It crossed my mind to throw it out there, what do you guys think of this idea? And tips and tricks for him?
 
Risky IMHO, esp. if for a few weeks. I'd do it only as a last resort.

Any chance the existing RAID controller supports an additional/multiple arrays? If so, another pair of drives, create an additional RAID1 array, format in Windows, move the store onto the new array. Performance may take a bit of a hit however.

If not, I'd go for a NAS solution supporting iSCSI, and house the store on that (but that requires a decent NAS, decent network backbone, UPS, etc).
 
Mal1ce said:
Risky IMHO, esp. if for a few weeks. I'd do it only as a last resort.

Any chance the existing RAID controller supports an additional/multiple arrays? If so, another pair of drives, create an additional RAID1 array, format in Windows, move the store onto the new array. Performance may take a bit of a hit however.

If not, I'd go for a NAS solution supporting iSCSI, and house the store on that (but that requires a decent NAS, decent network backbone, UPS, etc).
Click to expand...

No need to format windows create another array and just move the Database to the new drive.

bekdik said:
I'm not sure that you can use an external drive for exchange.

He could install more local disk and move the store that.
Click to expand...

I did a server migration this weekend of an exchange server that crashed and the information store was running of an external drive temporarily. It does work but everything is so slow it creates a nightmare for the users to work. So I say it's not a viable option.

@OP have your friend done a offline defrag of the DB? It can save you quite a bit of space which buys you time to come up with a better plan.
 
+1 Defrag of DB helps loads, I save a Clint 17GB a week by doing this...

External drive is poiisble but like the previous post, VERY slow, they prob won't be able to open calendars It's that slow!
 
Spoke to him, he hasn't done an offline defrag. Just a quick question. For a mailbox store thats about 100gigs, how long do you think the offline defrag will take and how much space will be saved? Just an estimate, I know it's difficult to say.
 
Best that your friend can do is to get a drobo or any other NAS device which have RAID1/RAID5 storage enabled. This will be the safest and best thing to do.

Better still if the NAS can be connected directly to the server instead of over the network.

If your friend want to do a defrag, he'll need double the space as the defrag program creates a copy of the exchange database. It can also be done via a mapped network drive, but isn't recommended.

And I would recommend that the defragging be done on new hard drives instead of the old hard drives, with a good backup copy of the Exchange mailstore database. You never know what will happen.
 
Oh, one final thing.

If you have to use an external drive/SAN/whatever, you must have a persistent connection/drive letter assigned to it. No good in having something that's not persistent as this will cause Exchange database corruption.
 
Is it an actual Exchange server or an SBS?
 
Once you're over the immediate crunch, migrate the whole system with Acronis Backup & Recovery and Acronis Recovery for MS Exchange. Essential backup and DR tools.
 
Normally start it at 8 and it's done in time for the 7am backup routine and it's a 80GB DB... But yea prob 5gb per hour... I normally save 15-17gb depending on if uv done one before... Enjoy!
 
Hi guys, just some feedback. I hopped onto his network to have a look. I found that his backup system (Symentec Backup Exec) was not backing up the exchange correctly, so any changes made to his exchange setup would reflect, as no backup was being made. Backup Exec was set to backup the exchange, but some reason, it wasn't doing so correctly. We ran a standard Windows backup, and it freed up loooots of space.

Weird hey?

Thank you again for your help guys
 
shakes1 said:
Hi guys, just some feedback. I hopped onto his network to have a look. I found that his backup system (Symentec Backup Exec) was not backing up the exchange correctly, so any changes made to his exchange setup would reflect, as no backup was being made. Backup Exec was set to backup the exchange, but some reason, it wasn't doing so correctly. We ran a standard Windows backup, and it freed up loooots of space.

Weird hey?

Thank you again for your help guys
Click to expand...

Exchange keeps its logs until a succesful backup,vastly increasing the space taken
 
On Exch 2003 just add 2 (bigger this time) drives and establish a new RAID1 array (consisting of the 2 new drives only)
(Keep the old RAID1 array intact for the OS & Exchange program files)

Then follow these instructions.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/821915

** for slightly enhanced performance move only the IS to the new array while leaving the Exchange logs on the old array (with the OS).

Offline defrags frees up some space (I do them quarterly).
But first change your "deleted items retention time" for mailboxes and mail items to 1 day & restart Exchange services.
Then do the defrag.
After the defrag is complete change "deleted items retention time" back to 30 days.

happy days.
 
shakes1 said:
Hi guys, just some feedback. I hopped onto his network to have a look. I found that his backup system (Symentec Backup Exec) was not backing up the exchange correctly, so any changes made to his exchange setup would reflect, as no backup was being made. Backup Exec was set to backup the exchange, but some reason, it wasn't doing so correctly. We ran a standard Windows backup, and it freed up loooots of space.

Weird hey?

Thank you again for your help guys
Click to expand...

Enable circular logging on the database if he's not doing any incremental backups. This will automatically clear the logs.
 
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