0

we used to have Exchange on the SBS 2003 server inside our AD environment. Earlier this year we moved to outside Exchange provider but for the time being our local Exchange was still up&running and forwarding email to the new email accounts.

Now the time has come to turn it off and I'm not quite sure what that means for SBS environment and how to proceed.

Specifically, there is a local e-mail account associated with every user in the domain. Can I simply change the e-mail address of every user to their outside address, or should I first delete the Exchange account for every user + their Mailbox, and only then update the e-mail address?

What do you suggest? How do I proceed? TNX!

imagodei
  • 499
  • 1
  • 3
  • 13

1 Answers1

1

Your best bet is to delete all of the user mailboxes on the SBS server (after you've backed up or exported the email from them) and then remove Exchange from the SBS component in Add Remove Programs.

joeqwerty
  • 109,901
  • 6
  • 81
  • 172
  • Is there an automated way to do that or do I have to manually do it (backup&delete mailboxes) for every user separately? And what about e-mail info in the user profile? How does Win2003 domain and AD play with an outside email references in user profile? – imagodei Nov 04 '10 at 10:50
  • 1
    It's largely a manual process. You can use Exmerge to export the contents all of the mailboxes to pst files from the server if the mailboxes are under 2GB in size. In ADUC you can select all of the user accounts, right click, select Exchange tasks, and select Delete mailbox. You'll need to reconfigure every Outlook profile to connect to the external email provider. W2K3 and AD don't care where the mailbox is. – joeqwerty Nov 04 '10 at 10:59
  • Thank you. I've already reconfigured Outlook profiles, so this should work. If I understand correctly, after I delete mailboxes the only thing left is to enter new email address into user profiles in AD and I'm done? The Exchange General and Exchange Advanced tabs will be gone? – imagodei Nov 04 '10 at 11:29
  • You won't need to enter any email addresses in AD for the users. There's no link between an AD user and an email address if Exchange isn't installed. You can add the email address if you like, but it has no bearing on the operation of AD. Also, don't confuse the email address with the UPN. A UPN is required and is normally set to the username@domain.local format, where domain.local is your AD DNS suffix. Once the mailboxes are deleted there won't be any Exchange related tabs on the user account properties. – joeqwerty Nov 04 '10 at 11:34
  • Yes, clear - no need to enter the email address. It is optional. :) Thank you again. – imagodei Nov 04 '10 at 11:41
  • Glad to help... Don't forget to accept my answer, if in fact you do accept it as your solution. :) – joeqwerty Nov 04 '10 at 12:32
  • I wouldn't forget :) I was just being courteous to others in case someone else had something to add. But I think it's safe to assume yor answer is the best despite being the only one. :) – imagodei Nov 04 '10 at 18:53
  • ADDENDUM: Does the situation change if the new email is at different domain (previously name.surename@domain1.com, now name.surename@domain2.com)? Also - I previously wanted to turn the local Exchange off, but in fact several local services would still need an email server (backup, helpdesk, AV control center...). Does running a local server changes anything? Should I then simply delete local email accounts for users and their corresponding mailboxes, leaving only email accounts for specific service users? – imagodei Nov 09 '10 at 09:01
  • You could do that, yes. You just need to make sure that you don't have internal and external email addresses that "match". Also, why not set up mailboxes with the new email provider for backup, helpdesk, etc? – joeqwerty Nov 09 '10 at 12:27
  • Well, I'm not sure that Backup (Symantec Backup Exec) or similar services can send e-mail thru outside server...? I see no options to set up authentication to email server in Backup Exec, only server name, port, and *send as* email field. I believe server has to be open relay (locally) for this to work? And I think some other services we use have a similar limitation - no authentication possible. – imagodei Nov 09 '10 at 13:22
  • What version of BackupExec are you running? Versions 12.5 and 2010 support SMTP authentication. I don't remember if earlier versions support it. – joeqwerty Nov 09 '10 at 20:43
  • Unfortunately it's version 10.1. I see no SMTP authentication. In any case I would need Exchange connection over HTTPS for this to work, as we will be still using Exchange server - it's just located at an offsite location. Do you think leaving local Exchange server in open relay for local clients would in any way interfere with accounts? As you put it previously: if I make sure that email addresses don't match...? Also, maybe turning Exchange off and setting up other email server on Linux would work as well... – imagodei Nov 10 '10 at 13:55
  • 1
    True enough about using another email server. That may be the best option. I've used hMailServer on Windows with good success. http://www.hmailserver.com/. – joeqwerty Nov 10 '10 at 15:05
  • Glad to help... – joeqwerty Nov 11 '10 at 13:43