I need some help. I'm new to outlook/exchange and it looks like our exchage server let's call it server01 running exchange server2003 works with no issues. It appears the users archive files .pst are on a different server - let's say server02. I have verified this by going into outlook - tools - options - mailsetup tab - datafiles. My question is it appears that storing these files on a network is a No No. However, if I put these files on a user's local drive, don't I risk loosing all data in the event of a hardware failure or if it winds up stolen. What's the right way/best practiceor is there??????? What does MS recommend and is there any documention out there?

If you are really worried about data lose what you want to do is this. First export all the pst files as a back up then switch it in outlook to goto the users my documents folder, and make their my documents folder be on a mapped drive and make sure you enable it to work offlilne. This will make it so that it 'syncs' with the server that the drive was mapped to. If the computer catches on fire you have a backup on the server if the server dies you have a backup on the local computer. And plus it works locally so its faster and more reliable then you sync and it connects to the server to copy everything at once. If you need help past this let me know and I will guide you if this is the direction that you would like to take.

What if hard disk of server 2 fails ? Well well, easiest way is to store ".PST"s on local hard disk drives of indivisual user. I wonder how come your total cost of ownership allows you to buy a dedicated server or stoarage just to store pst's of user's. Well it's not a good choice. Better you redirct CEO, Project managers mails to there personal e-mail client like GMAIL , Yahoo! , MSN where they get unlimited space. So in case stoarage crashes mails remains on a server hosting hotmail, GMAIL of respective user's. Cheer's, Amey.

if it fails then you still have the pst on the local computer. Im not sure what your stating because the only other method you could do on top of this is to get offline storage and have that run at night