Hi All, I am working on my migration from 2003 to 2010 and I have a couple of database questions. 1. Is there any type of "methodology" as to creating databases, or are they really just for ease of management? Going a little further, if I were to create a number of separate databases in my environment, I'd want to base them on department/business unit (one named "Accounting", one named "Legal", one named "Marketing", etc); similar to the way my OUs are set up in AD. Doing it that way half of my user-base would be in one database (approximately 85 users and upwards of 85GB) whereas the other databases would be between five & ten users with varying mailbox sizes. Would there be any issues with doing it that way, or should my database design be more to "Balance-Out" the number of mailboxes? Like, splitting up the databases in to 50 user chunks? 2. I started working with the Mailbox role today and I moved the default mailbox database and default public folder database to new folders/volumes, but I didn't change their names. Would it be okay to run the Move Database Path wizard again to change their names? Having the long string of numbers after them just bugs me a bit. 2a. If I can change the names of the databases will it screw anything up? Specifically my Public Folder Database, as I have already started the replication steps on them. The Mailbox database is still empty at this point. 3. Speaking of replication, I went ahead and set the 2003 back-end to replicate its two Offline Address Book and its one Schedule+ Free Busy folder to the 2010 Mailbox Server, and conversely, set the 2010 Mailbox server to replicate its one Offline Address Book and two Schedule+ Free Busy folders to the 2003 back-end server. 3a. Why are there two Offline Address Books on the 2003 server? 3b. Why are there two Schedule+ Free Busy folders on the 2010 server? Thanks in advance!

Database design in the main comes down to one thing only - recovery. You need to balance the layout of the mailboxes and the size of the database so that if you have to recover the database you can do so quickly. There is no point in having one database of 200gb and another of 20gb, when you could have two of 110gb, or even 4 of around 50gb. You have to look at your SLA and how quickly the data needs to come back. To rename the databases and the files, use the wizard again. That is all I do. That way everything is changed for you correctly. You shouldn't have duplicated system folders. That could be legacy data. OAB will have a number of sub folders and Schedule Plus just the one, but other than that, there should just be one of each. Simon.Simon Butler, Exchange MVP Blog | Exchange Resources

Hi Simon, Thank you for the reply. The database structure points make sense. I'll need to talk with by boss to see how we want to do it. You shouldn't have duplicated system folders. That could be legacy data. OAB will have a number of sub folders and Schedule Plus just the one, but other than that, there should just be one of each. Really? All of the things I've read have said I need to replicate the 2003 OAB folders to the 2010 server, and the 2010 ones to the 2003 server, and the same with the Schedule+ folders (replicate 2003 to 2010 and replicate 2010 to 2003). Is that not the case? The two OABs in 2003 are listed as "o=COMPANY_NAME/cn=addrlists/cn=oabs/cn=Default Offline Address List/" and "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=DOMAIN_NAME/". The one in 2010 is listed as "EX:/COMPANY_NAME/ou=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT)/" The Schedule+ in 2003 is "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=DOMAIN_NAME/". The two in 2010 are "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT)" and "EX:/O=COMPANY_NAME/OU=EXTERNAL (FYDIBOHF25SPDLT)". So what am I doing wrong here? A litle additional info (if it helps): I am running one 2003 back-end server, one 2003 front-end server, one 2010 server with the Mailbox role, and one 2010 server with the CAS and HT roles (combined). This Exchange infrastructure has been upgraded from 5.5 to 2003 (about six years ago), and now to 2010. Thanks again!

Hi Simon, Thank you for the reply. The database structure points make sense. I'll need to talk with by boss to see how we want to do it. You shouldn't have duplicated system folders. That could be legacy data. OAB will have a number of sub folders and Schedule Plus just the one, but other than that, there should just be one of each. Really? All of the things I've read have said I need to replicate the 2003 OAB folders to the 2010 server, and the 2010 ones to the 2003 server, and the same with the Schedule+ folders (replicate 2003 to 2010 and replicate 2010 to 2003). Is that not the case? The two OABs in 2003 are listed as "o=COMPANY_NAME/cn=addrlists/cn=oabs/cn=Default Offline Address List/" and "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=DOMAIN_NAME/". The one in 2010 is listed as "EX:/COMPANY_NAME/ou=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT)/" The Schedule+ in 2003 is "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=DOMAIN_NAME/". The two in 2010 are "EX:/o=COMPANY_NAME/ou=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT)" and "EX:/O=COMPANY_NAME/OU=EXTERNAL (FYDIBOHF25SPDLT)". So what am I doing wrong here? A litle additional info (if it helps): I am running one 2003 back-end server, one 2003 front-end server, one 2010 server with the Mailbox role, and one 2010 server with the CAS and HT roles (combined). This Exchange infrastructure has been upgraded from 5.5 to 2003 (about six years ago), and now to 2010. Thanks again!

The point of replicating the data is so that you have data from both servers in the same folders. OAB and Free/Busy are legacy folders, designed for use with older versions of Outlook. Therefore if you have added a public folder store to the Exchange 2010 server, you would replicate the data in to the that server from the Exchange 2003 server. It certainly looks like you have legacy content which is causing some problems. Now the advantage of free/busy and OAB is that it isn't unique, it can be easily replaced, although it doesn't explain why you have the duplication. If you haven't already, I would start with running the Exchange best practises tool from the Toolbox and see whether that flags anything of interest. Simon.Simon Butler, Exchange MVP Blog | Exchange Resources

The point of replicating the data is so that you have data from both servers in the same folders. OAB and Free/Busy are legacy folders, designed for use with older versions of Outlook. Therefore if you have added a public folder store to the Exchange 2010 server, you would replicate the data in to the that server from the Exchange 2003 server. It certainly looks like you have legacy content which is causing some problems. Now the advantage of free/busy and OAB is that it isn't unique, it can be easily replaced, although it doesn't explain why you have the duplication. If you haven't already, I would start with running the Exchange best practises tool from the Toolbox and see whether that flags anything of interest. Simon.Simon Butler, Exchange MVP Blog | Exchange Resources

What scan should I run and what results am I looking for? I already did the Health, Permissions, and am starting a Baseline (quite a few options here, lol) but so far there haven't been any real cause for alarm on anything, or anything relating to the System folders. Thanks again!

If the Health scan didn't throw anything up of interest, then that is fine. It is one of those tools that is pretty cut and dried - although some things can be ignored. In this case, if it isn't showing anything for errors with public folders then don't worry about that tool. Instinct says that something is hanging around because of the multiple migrations. This has confused the system folder replication. The first thing I would be doing is seeing which folder is being used by looking at the output of get-publicfolderstatistics. Both OAB and Free/Busy should not be zero if they are in use. Another test would be to connect a client to a mailbox on that new server and see if the OAB is downloaded correctly and it can query the OAB information through a new calendar appointment. Whether you actually have a problem though is a different matter. Simon.Simon Butler, Exchange MVP Blog | Exchange Resources

Of the three Schedule+ folders the only one with any information in it (according to the Public Folder Management Console) is the one that was replicated from the 2003 server; the two new ones created by 2010 have 0 items and 0KB. Of the three OABs I have only one of the 2003 folders has data, the other says "Not available on this server." (may be a 5.5 remnent?) and the one created by the 2010 install empty. So I guess I'm okay... Plus we're planning on migrating everyone from Outlook 2003 to Outlook 2010 before the end of the year. My understanding is that when everyone is done with 2003 I can safely remove these legacy System Folders, correct? Thanks again!