I recently add two servers to my Exchange 2003 organization, before installing them I ran the domain prep and then installed the servers. I created a user on each server and they have no problem sending e-mails or receiving mails from outside the organization, but if someone from the first server in the organization tries to send an e-mail to a user on the new servers, they stay on a queues. Do I need to configure anything for it to be mail flow between the servers? Regards, Pablo E. Perie K.

There is no need to configure anything for the servers toable tosend mail to each other.Have you configured any settings on the "virtual SMTP server" such as smart host on the first box? /Lasse

Lasse: I haven't configure anything on the SMTP Virtual server The first Exchange server is the local bridgehead and master of the routing group, he is the one with the smart host configured. I also have a SMTP connector with other organization, but that is working perfectly. Should I have run Forestprep before installing the servers?

Should I have run Forestprep before installing the servers? No, you must run Forestprep just one time, and run Domainprep in each domain that will have e-mail enabled object. This link the best to understand this operations,I think. http://msexchange.org/tutorials/Forestprep-Domainprep-Explained.html

what happens when you telnet from one server to the other on port 25?

Thanks all for your help, the first Exchange server that I had installed in the organization, had a Smart host configured in the SMTP virtual server. I created a SMTP connector to route the messages to the smart host. Everything is working ok now. Regards, Pablo.

Pablo, Could you go further in depth as to how you solved your problem? I have almost the exact same problem, but I don't believe I have a Smart host configured on my Exchange 2003 server. I started out with our original Exchange 2003 server at our main office, added an Exchange 2007 server at a branch office (same domain, different "site") everything worked swell. Mail could flow back and forth from the Exchange 2007 server and the original Exchange 2003 server, mailboxes on the 2003 box could send and recieve internet and so could the 2007 mailboxes at the remote site. Here is where it gets tricky. We got our new server at our main office which we want to migrate our main office mailboxes to. I followed the instructions to add the additional 2007 server to the legacy routing group. Almost everything is okay,mailboxes on the2007 server at the main office can e-mail with the 2003 server at the main office, the 2007 server at the remote site and the internet. The problem is that mail from the remote site addressed to mailboxes at the new main office 2007 server gets stuck at the remote site queue. I think this sounds similar to the same problem you were having. Anyone else have any ideas? Thanks, Ben

Ben: my situation differs a bit from yours, in my case the organization is completely Exchange 2003, the problem I had was because we have a Mail Marshall server which scans all incoming and outgoing mail. In order to send all messages throug it, we added a smart host on the SMTP virtual server instead of creating an SMTP connector. Because of that, when my first server was sending messages to the new ones, it was trying to do it throug the Mail Marshall server. When I removed the smart host and created an SMTP conector, the problem was corrected. Regards, Pablo.

This is a very common misstake. configure smarthost on the virtual SMTP servers is not good and will break mailflow. If you need to configure a smarthost do it on a SMTP connector.