Project Coconut: Part 1 – Getting the environment up to scratch

Project Coconut Entries:

• Part 1 – Getting the environment up to scratch
• Part 2 – Sizing the Exchange Server 2007 servers
• Part 3 – Deploying the first Exchange Server 2007 server
• Part 4 – Configuring Standby Continuous Replication
• Part 5 – Its mailbox migration time!
• Part 6 – Finishing the job

Getting The Environment Up To Scratch

Project Coconut is underway and the first bit of action is getting the environment up to the pre-requisites for Exchange Server 2007. The existing environment is Active Directory in Windows 2000 Native Mode, with Windows 2000 Server domain controllers, and an Exchange 2000 Server organisation also running on Windows 2000 Server member servers.

While there are many Active Directory Sites in this environment there are only two that are relevant to the Exchange Server 2007 deployment – the HQ site, and the DR site. These are two well-connected locations with unique subnets, which rules out clustering the planned Windows Server 2003 hosts, but with Exchange Server 2007 SP1 allows us to implement site resiliency through Standby Continuous Replication (SCR).

Lets start by taking a look at the Active Directory requirements of Exchange Server 2007.

Exchange Server 2007 Active Directory Requirements

The full detail is available here, but I have summarised the requirements as follows:

As you can see the environment does not meet the pre-requisites for Active Directory. Although DNS is properly configured and the Domain and Forest functional levels are correct, the Windows 2000 Server Domain Controllers will not support Exchange Server 2007.

To meet the pre-requisites will require at least one Domain Controller in each of the HQ and DR sites to be built or upgraded to Windows Server 2003 SP1 or later. By building a server in each site, promoting it to a Domain Controller, setting them each as Global Catalogs, and moving the Schema Master FSMO role to the new DC at HQ, the Active Directory pre-requisites will be met.

The decision was made to deploy new, virtualised Domain Controllers at the DR site, and upgrade the existing Domain Controllers at the HQ site. But before either of these tasks is performed the Active Directory Schema must be updated for Windows Server 2003. This is not a trivial undertaking, and as such you should review the following comprehensive guidance from Microsoft:

How to upgrade Windows 2000 domain controllers to Windows Server 2003

If you do not follow this guidance there are a lot of different issues you can run into such as incompatible SMB clients, and mangled Exchange attributes. Be sure to read the article above, and also this article that specifically deals with the Exchange attributes issue.

Windows Server 2003 adprep /forestprep command causes mangled attributes in Windows 2000 forests that contain Exchange 2000 servers

Once the Schema has been successfully extended you can install or upgrade your Domain Controllers to Windows Server 2003. In this case I am installing Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard Edition. Because the R2 discs did not have Service Pack 2 included I first slipstreamed SP2 into them. This speeds up the deployment process because you don’t have to waste time installing the Service Pack after the server is up and running.

Microsoft’s guidance linked above on upgrading Domain Controllers is worth following, but what they don’t seem to mention is that you obviously should have on hand the latest Windows Server 2003 compatible drivers for your server hardware, particularly for important components such as the RAID card and the network adapters. Its no fun to see a BSOD or find your DC unable to connect to the network on first boot.

With the Active Directory pre-requisites out of the way it is time to look at the Exchange Organisation pre-requisites.

Exchange Server 2007 Existing Exchange Organisation Requirements

The pre-requisites for an upgrading an existing Exchange organisation to Exchange Server 2007 are as follows:

After all of the fun with Active Directory it is nice to see that for Project Coconut the organisation pre-requisites are already met. The Exchange environment is already consolidated into a single Exchange 2000 Server. Other than auditing the environment to plan the configuration of Exchange Server 2007 there is no preparation work required here.

Next on Project Coconut I’ll be discussing how I sized the hardware for the new Exchange Server 2007 hosts.