Hello, I'm having a weird situation. The company I work for migrated their Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2010 last year and everything works fine. Recently, the management requested me to restore a mailbox from a backup that was taken in 2010, on the Exchange 2003. I cannot restore the mailbox directly onto the Exchange 2010, and that's understandable. The server on which the Exchange 2003 resided is still intact, except that Exchange is no longer on it. So I thought about restoring all the data that I have for this server from the tape. It goes well until it tries to restore the First Storage Group and then the restore operation fails. The error message I get on the backup server is this: Restore- \\exchange.domain.local\Microsoft Information Store\First Storage Group exchange.domain.local V-79-57344-65280 - Unable to restore the selected Microsoft Exchange databases because one or more of the storage group's databases are mounted. Use the Exchange System Manager to dismount all the databases for the storage group 'First Storage Group', and then retry the job. V-79-57344-65217 - An error occurred while completing the operation on \\exchange.domain.local\Microsoft Information Store\First Storage Group A failure occurred performing the post-restore operation. V-79-57344-65072 - Connection to the restore target has been lost. Operation canceled. So, I logon to the server and try to start the Exchange System Manager and I get this error (in a pop-up box): Exchange System Manager The server is not operational. Facility: Win32 ID no: 8007203a Exchange System Manager How do I dismount all the databases for the first storage group if I cant start the Exchange System Manager? Thank you,

The server on which the Exchange 2003 resided is still intact, except that Exchange is no longer on it ------------------------ If there is no Exchange 2003 available - --- Build a Test Environment with the same domain name, Same Exchange ORG name , Same Exchange server name Restore the Backup to a different location and we can have the databases restored on that server. and then we can take a pst out of it or Re install Exchange 2003 in the same env ---- Better solution is Restore Exchange 2003 Db to a different server location use a 3rd party utility like edb to pst, take the data out of it Satheshwaran Manoharan | Exchange 2003/2007/2010 | Blog:http://www.careexchange.in | Please mark it as an answer if it really helps you

Hi Satheshwaran, I don't have a lot of experience in Exchange other than day to day management. Can I restore the db to any server on our network? Working with this 3rd party tool, will that allow me to export the individual mailbox to a pst file? Thank you,

Yes the Backup software should have a option . Restoring your DB to a different location. -- You can ,search - edb to pst for exchange 2003 , should give some softwares for youSatheshwaran Manoharan | Exchange 2003/2007/2010 | Blog:http://www.careexchange.in | Please mark it as an answer if it really helps you

Most backup applications will allow you to restore the database files to disk and that might be via restore to alternate location or something along those lines. Once you get the files to disk check out Lucid8's DigiScope http://www.lucid8.com/product/digiscope.asp which will let you open any offline Exchange database so that you can Browse, Search, Export the Mailboxes, Folders and Individual items to PST & MSG formats or if desired recover direct from the offline database files into ANY production exchange server, even cross version i.e. 2003 --> 2007 --> 2010 etc. NOTE: As Satheshwaran says there are other products on the market as well, however, all are not created equally. Top 3 products are Kroll, Lucid8 and Quest. The others look good on the surface but when you examine the resulting data there are many issues, so just be careful.Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

Just to report back. It seems as if I don't have a proper backup of the database, unless I'm looking at the wrong place. I searched for *.edb files on my server and I got a few of them. The largest file is named DataStore.edb and its size is 79,880KB - nearly 80MB. That's too small to be the actual database I'm looking for. Also, this file is located in C:\WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore. Could this be the right file I'm looking for? Thank you,

Hi troy, Thank you for your information. Although I didn't try any of it yet, it seems to be valuable! Thanks again,

Happy to assist and; no that's the wrong file set, you would need to look at doing the recovery via the Exchange agent so when you browse to do a recovery there should be an option to recover Exchange Information Stores What backup software are you using?Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

I'm using Backup Exec 2010 R3. I think the backup I'm looking at is incomplete. I don't see anything that could help me recove this mailbox. My only solution at this point is to rebuild the server and then restore the mailbox from the tape to it. Thanks again,

Well you need to see if there is an option to restore an Exchange Information store at all since that is what you would need to do, however if the server has had the Exchange components removed then you may have a hard time making it happen since once 2003 is removed after installing a 2010 server you cannot add a 2003 Exchange server back into the same forest. So you may have to build a recovery network, i.e. Exchange server, DS etc on separate hardware that is not connected to your production network in any way or bad things will happen. if you can find the recovery option that list true Exchange Information store backups then these might help http://www.symantec.com/connect/articles/restoring-exchange-or-individual-mailboxesitems-using-backup-exec-howto http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH29719Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

I selected the mailbox I need to restore and then it went through the staging process. After 93GB of staging data, it gave me an error. Error category : Resource ErrorsError : e000848c - Unable to attach to a resource. Make sure that all selected resources exist and are online, and then try again. If the server or resource no longer exists, remove it from the selection list. Edit the selection list properties, click the View Selection DFor additional information regarding this error refer to link V-79-57344-3393.

you want to recover the ENTIRE DB to disk not the mailbox. You should however look to see if the Exchange Database is still on disk at the point of failure because Backup Exec has to recover the entire DB to disk first and then it has to open it to extract mailbox contents. So could be its on the disk.Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

BTW for 2003 the files you are looking for will be a matching pair i.e. "Whatever the database name is" .EDB and .STM and there will also be some .log files that are part of the restore which you can get by without but easier if you have themTroy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

Do you know which selections to make using Backup Exec? Because I tried a few options and they all failed.

no haven't worked with BE in some time but 1. see if there is a redirect option and then restore the information store as files only. 2. another option that might work is to Duplicate a Job to Disk as follows however you need to ensure you are doing this for the Exchange Database. Check for a drive with sufficient disk space for the restore. The available space must be at least the size of the Exchange Store and Log files to be restored. On the target drive, create a folder called: Exchange Restore Open Backup Exec, and Go to Devices. Right-click Backup-to-Disk Folders, and choose: New Backup-to-Disk Folder. Give it the name: Exchange Restore, Point it to the target drive and folder. Click OK. Go to Job Setup, select the job that runs for the site, and under Backup Tasks, Choose: New job to duplicate backup sets. Choose OK. Browse the server concerned, and under Microsoft Information Store, choose the Information Store you want to stage to disk. You need to select the date/media. Choose the new Backup-to-Disk folder created for this purpose Click Run Now. Let the job complete. Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

no haven't worked with BE in some time but 1. see if there is a redirect option and then restore the information store as files only. 2. another option that might work is to Duplicate a Job to Disk as follows however you need to ensure you are doing this for the Exchange Database. Check for a drive with sufficient disk space for the restore. The available space must be at least the size of the Exchange Store and Log files to be restored. On the target drive, create a folder called: Exchange Restore Open Backup Exec, and Go to Devices. Right-click Backup-to-Disk Folders, and choose: New Backup-to-Disk Folder. Give it the name: Exchange Restore, Point it to the target drive and folder. Click OK. Go to Job Setup, select the job that runs for the site, and under Backup Tasks, Choose: New job to duplicate backup sets. Choose OK. Browse the server concerned, and under Microsoft Information Store, choose the Information Store you want to stage to disk. You need to select the date/media. Choose the new Backup-to-Disk folder created for this purpose Click Run Now. Let the job complete. Troy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

Thanks Troy, you were very helpful. My day is almost over so I will do that tomorrow morning and post back with my results.

ok, hopefully it will help :-) have a good evening and I look forward to hearing the results tomorrowTroy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope

Hi Troy, Just to let you know, I don't have the database on my backup tape. No choice but to rebuild the server then restore the nmailbox to it. Thank you for all your help,

Technically if you have the ability to restore by mailbox it has a copy of the DB that its pulling the Mailbox info from. You might ask Symantec if there is a way to stage that database to disk so that you can pull the needed database files from. If not then yes you will have to build a recovery server in order to make this happenTroy Werelius www.Lucid8.com Search, Recover, & Extract Mailboxes, Folders, & Email Items from Offline EDB's and Live Exchange Servers with Lucid8's DigiScope