I have a question about creating AD and Exchange lab environment?. How do you guys create a lab (production mimic)? AD we can easily create additional DCs and move it to an isolated lab environment/network and seize the FSMO roles. How do you mimic Exchange environment in the lab? Is it possible to bring all mailboxes without any data

I want to mimic production environmental in the LAB. I hope you understand that! Have you ever done this?

Hi It's a bit tricky to do but there are a few ways to achieve this. Something that I have done before is recovered an CAS server (setup /m:recoverserver) in a lab but if you have multiple servers with DAGs etc this method gets a bit complicated. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd876880.aspx Steve

Thanks Steve. We are using Exchange 2003. Any suggestions? I came up with this option - http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/Recovering-Failed-Exchange-2003-Member-Server-Using-Disaster-Recovery-Switch.html

How about like this, Getting a Standalone DC with the Same domain name and GC name. Restorte a System State Backup to it -- Do A Recover Server for Exchange. -- Mount the Database from Backup -- LAB should be ready, I haven't tried the AD part alone, But it should work if my thought is rightSatheshwaran Manoharan | Exchange 2003/2007/2010 | Blog:http://www.careexchange.in | Please mark it as an answer if it really helps you

No need to build an empty domain. The restore from ntbackup/whatever should be sufficient. Mike Crowley | MVP My Blog -- Planet Technologies