To migrate or not to migrate?

Migration can mean many things to many people; but when it comes to Exchange it usually means: ‘out with the old and in with the new’. Seldom do we see two versions running side by side in any organisation, except during migration. Having said that there is always a concern in upgrading to a new version of any Microsoft product – namely, will it be better? And more importantly, will it be stable?

Well, after many hours spent designing, installing, configuring and finally supporting the different versions, I have to conclude that the latest iteration of Microsoft Exchange 2010 provides the best business class messaging in the market place. Apparently I am not the only one, as Figure 1 shows.

Even if we accept that Exchange 2010 is the best in its class, it is still important to gauge whether it is worth upgrading or migrating to it. This will depend on your existing version of Exchange and how your business needs have changed.

Let’s first take a look at what has changed between MS Exchange versions 2003 and 2007, and what 2010 now offers.

Product: Microsoft Exchange 2003 (32bit)

Support Life Cycle: Extended Support with Service Pack 3 (no support after 08/04/2014)

Primary features:

• RPC over HTTP secure mapi client access without vpn
• Mailbox can sync with Blackberry device
• Calendar sharing
• MAPI & POP3 client support
• Recovery Storage Group
• Anti-spam features like Send ID filtering and Intelligent message filtering, connection filtering and recipient filtering
• ActiveSync

 

Product: Microsoft Exchange 2007 (32bit/64bit production only)

Support Life Cycle: Mainstream Support (no support after 11/04/2017)

Primary features:

• High availability options – LCR, CCR, SCC & SCR
• Exchange management shell – PowerShell V1
• Enhanced OWA options like voice mail in OWA
• Secure communication between servers – TLS encryptions
• Runs on 64 bit platform only
• New antivirus and anti-spam feature
• Outlook Anywhere formerly known as RPC over HTTP
• Clustering at database and server level
• Unified messaging
• Increased database size minimum level and limited to 16 TB
• Increased number of Storage Groups, SE – 5 SGS and EE – 50 SG%

 

Product: Microsoft Exchange 2010 (64bit)

Support Life Cycle: Mainstream Support (no support after 11/04/2020)

Primary Features:

• Storage Groups are removed. Databases are organisation- not server-based
• Clustering at database level not server level. Database Availability Groups are introduced
• Role based access control – permission model in Exchange Server 2007 was replaced
• Remote Exchange server administration with new Exchange management shell
• Anywhere access – e-Mail, voice mail and text messaging from single application
• Improved unified messaging feature, such as voice mail preview, message waiting indicator, incoming fax support
• Improved Outlook web app features, such as search folders, message filtering, conversation view
• Improved protection and compliance features, such as e-mail archiving and retention functionality
• Office365 integration for hosted and on-premises management
• User based mailbox management ECP
• Increased number of mailbox databases, SE – 5 databases and E – 100 databases

 

The role-based and scalable nature of MS Exchange 2010 means the deployment framework is very varied, with just about every company implementing a different design. But for now I will illustrate a well-rounded feature-rich deployment model, that will, I believe, answer some of the questions we receive when designing MS Exchange 2010 environments or migrating from earlier versions.

Written by: PaulB