Have 2003 SBS Exhange SP2 with 64 gig total (of 75 max) according to Event ID 1216 in Application Event. Have several users who are in process of archiving the mailboxes to shrink their mailboxes below 2-3 Gig @. Will dropping the aggregate of mailbox sizes keep us from triggering upper limit, or is it necessary for me to do an off-line defrag to keep from reaching the upper limit..., ie, which does EXchange 2003 count as the aggregatge for the limit? craig finnefrock

Yes, when Exchange maintenance runs the amount of white space will be calculated and this number will be subtracted from the total file sizes. If there is space the database wont dismount. EG, the database files can add up to 80GB (EDB and STM) and as long as event 1221 is reporting (say) 10GB of free space youve got 5GB of leeway. Numbers for illustration only. "computermagic" wrote in message news:2a3f7168-ad67-4b73-b3f8-29006fba452d... Have 2003 SBS Exhange SP2 with 64 gig total (of 75 max) according to Event ID 1216 in Application Event. Have several users who are in process of archiving the mailboxes to shrink their mailboxes below 2-3 Gig @. Will dropping the aggregate of mailbox sizes keep us from triggering upper limit, or is it necessary for me to do an off-line defrag to keep from reaching the upper limit..., ie, which does EXchange 2003 count as the aggregatge for the limit? craig finnefrock Mark Arnold, Exchange MVP.

And to add to Mark's comments: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa998066(EXCHG.65).aspx Database Size Limit Configuration and Management Size check done against the database now uses logical database size. Empty or white space in the database does not count against the configured database size limit; therefore, no offline defragmenting is required for recovery exceeding the configured or licensed database limits.

Mark: You said that "Exchange management" will shrink it , implying that the deleted-thru-archiving would be "white space" and therefore the database portion would be spaller in Application ID 1216... I last evening , after all the individual archiving, I Right-clicked on Server in Exhcange System Manager and cliced on Start Mailbox Management Process .... The result is that mailbox size in App log is unchanged at 64 gigs, even tho it should have been at least 10-15 Gig less. Is not that what you meant for me to do by "Exchange Management" craig finnefrock

Mark is referring to the online maintenance that runs everyday by default. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996226(EXCHG.65).aspx Exchange Store Maintenance