Banckground - we were sold by big company A and bought by little company B. We have the luxury of standing up a brand new AD2003 domain and a Ex2007 Org. Need assistance with PrepareSchema issues. Root DC in seperate site, so I moved the schema master role to the DC in the same site as the new exchange 2007 member server. Using a user account that is a member of both Schema Admins and Enterprise admins, as well as Domain admins on the child domain where we want to install the exchange box. I keep getting this error and am out of ideas: D:\>setup.com /PrepareSchema Welcome to Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Unattended Setup Preparing Exchange Setup No server roles will be installed Performing Microsoft Exchange Server Prerequisite Check Organization Checks ......................... FAILEDThe Active Directory schema will be upgraded if you continue. Verify that the organization is ready for Exchange 2007 by running the Exchange 2007 Readiness Check, which is part of the Exchange Best Practices Analyzer. The Active Directory Schema is not up-to-date, and this user account is nota member of the 'Schema Admins' and/or 'Enterprise Admins' group. Global updates need to be made to Active Directory, and this user account is not a member of the 'Enterprise Admins' group. The Exchange Server setup operation did not complete. Visit http://support.microsoft.com and enter the Error ID to find more information. Exchange Server setup encountered an error. D:\> Any help or insight would be appreciated!

This was crucial to helping me get prepared for my domain prep: http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/Installing-Exchange-2007-Part1.html You'll want to make sure all the pre-req stuff for the domain prep is there, like you're running in the highest domain functional level. Also, check that your servers are Global Catalog servers (i made every server I had a GC just to be sure) and that they're replicating properly (replmon.exe helps to see if they are). Also, as it might just be the obvious clue, where it says 'your account is not a member of the enterprise groups etc'.. make sure that the account that you're logged in with is a member of those groups in your domain. Log out of windows, log back in, re-run it. Hope that's something resembling help.

Thanks for the reply Gabriel. I actually read and had that article handy beforehand as well. All DC's are GC's. Four physical sites - DefaultFirstSite which contains the Forest root DC. SiteA contains Child DC which also holds the Schema Master role and is the physical site where the New exchange organization is being installed SiteB contains Child DC SiteC contains Child DC The account I'm using (actually, I've tried many - each with the same error msg) is a member of Enterprise Admins, Schema Admins, and Domain Admins (child domain). Functional Level of the Domain (forest and child) is 2003 Native. Replmon shows no replication errors and all is as I'd expect. Any help at all is much appreciated.

Update: I've moved the Forest DC into the same site (SiteA) as the first child DC & new exchange server. Still get the msg that I'm not a member of Schema Admins or Enterprise Admins group. The exchange box is a member of the Childdomain - does it need to be a member of the forest domain instead maybe? Edit: PS, do MS staff work on answering these questions or is it strictly up to fellow professionals taking the time to do so?

Still can't get past PrepareSchema steps. More than 5 days on this issue now, any ideas at all folks? [2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] Performing Microsoft Exchange Server Prerequisite Check[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] Setup is determining what organization-level operations to perform.[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] The command-line option prepareschema has been specified.[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] Because the command-line option prepareschema was specified, setup is adding the argument PrepareSchema.[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] Because the command-line option prepareschema was specified, setup is adding the argument PrepareLegacyExchangePermissions.[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] **************[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [0] Setup will run the task 'test-setuphealth'[2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [1] Setup launched task 'test-setuphealth -DomainController 'MAIL01.CHILDA.ROOT.NET' -DownloadConfigurationUpdates $true -ExchangeVersion '8.0.685.25' -Roles 'Global' -ScanType 'PrecheckInstall' -SetupRoles 'Global' -PrepareLegacyExchangePermissions $null -PrepareSchema $true' [2/4/2008 10:35:23 AM] [1] Beginning processing.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [1] [ERROR] The Active Directory Schema is not up-to-date, and this user account is not a member of the 'Schema Admins' and/or 'Enterprise Admins' group.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [1] [ERROR] Global updates need to be made to Active Directory, and this user account is not a member of the 'Enterprise Admins' group.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [1] [WARNING] The Active Directory schema will be upgraded if you continue. Verify that the organization is ready for Exchange 2007 by running the Exchange 2007 Readiness Check, which is part of the Exchange Best Practices Analyzer.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [1] Ending processing.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [0] The Exchange Server setup operation did not complete. Visit http://support.microsoft.com and enter the Error ID to find more information.[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [0] End of Setup[2/4/2008 10:35:44 AM] [0] **********************************************

Found the problem - needed to run PrepareSchema from the root forestdomain using either a x64 OS server or the 32 bit version exchange 2007. I had been using Exchange 2007 prior to this and the only error msg's I received were posted above. When I downloaded and used Exchange 2007 SP1 this morning I received MUCH more useful messages directing me to run prep schema from a member server on the root forest. Soon as I did that, problem resolved.