Recovering Information store

[Charles Lavin]

Hi --

I have an Exchange 2003 SP2 (SBS 2003 SP2) server that was just wiped and
completely reloaded. Continuing problems with screwed-up updates and AD
issues just got to be too much, and the server was wiped clean, reinstalled,
and jumped to the latest SPs on all software.

I have the Exchsrvr\MDBDATA folder (several copies of it for safekeeping)
from before the wipe. How do I power up Exchange so that I can recover the
contents of the information store and reassign the mailboxes to the new AD
users?

Thanks
CL

[Mark Arnold [MVP]]

so what is it you're asking? In one post you have a store and you want
help getting mail out of it as part of some investigation or whatever
and now you've gone and trashed your box for a reload. What are you
/actually, really// doing here?

Right now I would call Kroll and download PowerControls and start
afresh with your SBS environment, use the tool to open the old files
and get the data out.

[Charles Lavin]

I thought I had asked a simple question ...

THIS question asked about how to reattach Exchange mailboxes using an
MDBDATA fileset from an SBS 2003 server that was wiped and reloaded. I
already wiped and reloaded that machine; rebuilt AD (there are only 4 users
on it, so it wasn't that big a deal); reconnected the PCs and reestablished
the users' profiles. What remains to be done is reattach their mailboxes,
which is something I really don't want to screw up.

BTW -- That server was wiped and reloaded because of multiple, repeated
problems involving the OS and AD that we were just tired of having to fix or
work around. The only thing on that server that worked consistently was
Exchange. And AFAIK Exchange was gracefully shut down, and the MDBDATA
folder was backed up before the server was wiped -- even though that MDBDATA
folder resides on a filesystem separate from Exchange (or, for that matter,
Windows). There's no reason to believe that there is any problem with those
database files. But AD was manually rebuilt, so I expect that Exchange might
have a problem mapping those mailboxes to the proper users. That's why I
posted this question. I have not started Exchange, and I have disabled all
Outlooks, until I am sure of the proper way to get these mailboxes
reattached.

ON ANOTHER POST, I asked about locating all emails inside a message store,
on a DIFFERENT Exchange server, that were sent to or received from a
particular user. We're already working on that. That other post referred to
an Exchange 2003 server on a Windows Server 2003 machine 40 miles away from
the machine referenced in this post, which is a SBS 2003 machine. That other
post has NOTHING to do with this post.

Tnx
CL

"Mark Arnold [MVP]" <ma...@mvps.org> wrote in message
news:0g0lg5hub4gamtov2...@4ax.com...

[Ed Crowley [MVP]]

You may be able to replace the EDB file that was created when you mounted
the store that was created when you installed Exchange with the old one.

It's probably better to move the EDB file and all the log and checkpoint
files somewhere else. You don't want any log or system files present in the
storage group transaction log and system directories (which are probably the
same). Note that this may be slightly complicated if your public store is
in the same storage group, in which case you'll need to be sure it's shut
down cleanly first.

Then you might try running ESEUTIL /MH to see if the database is in a clean
shutdown state. If it is, you might be able to mount it. If not, you might
be able to run ESEUTIL /R and then try mounting it. If that doesn't work,
you might need to run ESEUTIL /P and then try mounting it. That last step
may destroy data.

After doing all that, you might be able to run the Mailbox Cleanup Agent and
then reconnect mailboxes to the Active Directory accounts. If you mailbox-
or mail-enabled those accounts, you'll want to Remove Exchange Attributes on
all of them first because you can't reconnect a mailbox to an account that
already has a mailbox.

None of this may work because what you're doing is very much nonstandard.
--
Ed Crowley MVP
"There are seldom good technological solutions to behavioral problems."
.

"Charles Lavin" <x@x.x> wrote in message
news:eJeLiNMb...@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...

[Charles Lavin]

I got the mailboxes up. The procedure is actually pretty straightforward but
not well documented. I know this isn't the preferred way of doing things,
but when confronted with an SBS box that's gone radioactive on you (again)
and whose backups you can't trust, and that suddenly can't run just about
anything in normal mode because something is running away with all the
server resources, you do what you can with you have ... :)

After making sure the EDB files were clean and defragmented, I was able to
successfully mount them. Running the ESM Mailbox Cleanup Wizard then
orphaned all the mailboxes. From there all I had to do was reassign them to
their new AD users. And restart Exchange.

I verified that the mailboxes, contacts and calendars were OK for each user
by logging into OWA. I didn't want to add another monkey wrench with the
Outlooks and what they might or might not have had cached ... Once I was
satisfied that everything was there, I backed up the "new" Exchange store,
then tried with Outlook.

Outlook at first wasn't sure whether it was creating a new account or
attaching to an existing one. But it figured it out after a few minutes of
crunching, and as far as I can tell everything is working OK.

Thanks for your help,
CL

"Ed Crowley [MVP]" <curs...@nospam.net> wrote in message
news:O2Sl%23DNbK...@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...