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ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????

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ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 10.Aug.2007 1:50:50 PM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Hello Everyone,

I am back and I am glad that we have so many supporting casts and fans of Exchange 2003!  Hurray!  :-)

I need help!  I have never ran an ESEUTIL on our Exchange server.  We have Exchange 2003 SP2 and Windows Server 2003 SP2.  Since having Exchange a little over a year now, we have about 1200 users with Exchange accounts.  My Director would like me to run ESEUTIL on our Exchange box (and we do have a webmail server separate) tomorrow.

Can anyone tell me which ESEUTIL parameter or value am I running?  I know there is ESEUTIL /D and ESEUTIL /G etc.  Which one do I run just so we can defragment our Exchange databases?

Please help me because I want to do it right but I don't know what exactly to run AND in what order should I run the steps.  How many steps are there? 

Can someone help me and maybe provide the steps I need to take to defrag our Exchange databases?

Thank you so much.  :-)

Lena
Post #: 1
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 10.Aug.2007 3:26:27 PM   
a.grogan

 

Posts: 1887
Joined: 12.Apr.2005
From: London
Status: offline 		Hiya Chap,

hmmm, firstly what would your director want you to run ESEUTIL?
The only practical reason would be to defrag the database and clear out the whitespace within the structure of the DB, however, running ESEUTILS should not be done without a good change control process prior to using the utility.
You need to establish why he wishes it to run, work out (by looking at the online maintenance results in the Application Event log) how much space you would potentially claim back, ensure that you have a clean and recoverable backup (yes it can go wrong).

Also you need to consider the demographics of your store, have you had a high turn over of staff?, do you have a number of large mailboxes that you have deleted?

Also ESEUTIL /D requires 110% of the size of the Database to run for its temp DB (ESEUTIL copies the existing Database into a temp database skipping the tomb stoned items and then deletes the old database and then renames the temp database to the old stores name - do you have this on any drive on your Exchange Server?)

I am not being difficult, its just that ESEUTIL needs to be treated with kid gloves as it can cause a lot of damage.

Cheers

A

_____________________________

Andy Grogan
MSExchange.org Forums Moderator
For my general ramblings about Exchange please visit my blog:
W: http://telnetport25.wordpress.com/
M: manifoldmaster@gmail.com

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 2
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 13.Aug.2007 2:40:42 AM   
nsvasan123

 

Posts: 85
Joined: 5.Jul.2007
Status: offline 		Hi,

   The eseutil is powerful one and I just want to share somethings which comes up to my mind and even u may be known... It can be used to check some of the things which does not harm our Exch Environment
Ex:
eseutil /mh - it helps to verify the State of Exch Dbase,Last shoutdown status(Dirty or Clean),lastbackup etc....
eseutil /ml - an integrity check for LOG files...
eseutil /mk -provides info about the CheckPoint files
   - Guys please shed some lights if i derail anywhere....Cheers!! 


_____________________________

Thanks & Regards,
NS

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 3
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 13.Aug.2007 7:47:28 AM   
vsin11

 

Posts: 168
Joined: 2.Apr.2007
Status: offline 		Hi,

I guess yuo want to defrag your database. However it would be good if you can first calculate the whitespaces in the database that can tell how much space can be recovered.
Here is the another way of doing that:
http://smarthost.blogspot.com/2007/06/calculate-amount-of-disk-space-to-be.html

Thanks.

_____________________________

Vinay Pal Singh
http://smarthost.blogspot.com

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 4
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 13.Aug.2007 9:00:31 AM   
sabel9579

 

Posts: 462
Joined: 4.Apr.2006
From: USA
Status: offline 		Running ESEUTIL should never need to be run unless instructed directly from Microsoft.  What is the reasoning behind this?

(in reply to vsin11)
Post #: 5
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003???? - 14.Aug.2007 1:39:15 AM   
ismail.mohammed

 

Posts: 2334
Joined: 9.May2007
From: India
Status: offline 		hi,

Eseutil command can be done without taking instruction from microsoft. Yes there is some powerful command which might effect your database that is eseutil /p, we should never use that command unless and untill it is really required to do or recommended to do i.e instructed by microsoft in most of the cases because it is a disaster recovery and it is called as hard repair.

Other command yes we can do it and it is good , - like eseutil /mh, /ms, /d.

In most of the cases whenever user not able to bring the database up they use to do just eseutil /p and at most after that they perform /d. which is not recommended at all. If we come across with such sort of situation then we need to run /p, /d and isninteg -fix. But exchange administrator use to forget those 3 steps which will harm your database in near future that is why microsoft always suggest never perform eseutil on the database unless and until it is recommended.

(in reply to sabel9579)
Post #: 6
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 15.Aug.2007 6:18:10 PM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Hi Andy Grogan or Anyone,

You are on the right track with what I am trying to do.  I do need to know where I am suppose to save the temp DB. 

How do I tell if I have 110% free space to run the ESEUTIL?  Where can I save this temp DB when I run the ESEUTIL?

Please help me.

Thanks.

Lena

(in reply to ismail.mohammed)
Post #: 7
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 15.Aug.2007 9:47:31 PM   
consultOz

 

Posts: 901
Joined: 11.Mar.2005
From: Virginia, USA
Status: offline 		Going trough to fulfill your Director request, check event it 1221 on the Exchange server Application log to determine how much white space you can recover if you do perform  offline defragmentation

I would have the same question as Andy asks, why your director is asking you to do this. Obviously mail is important for any business these days and taking stores offline=Outage is not the preferred way, what many business wants.
I would say if you do not have generous space to reclaim, leave it alone. Assuming you have checked the event ID 1221 on your exchange server and determine how much White space can be recovered. Remember, it is only recommended if at least 30% of the space taken by the database will be recovered.


Andy already covered all the switches you need to get the work done, therefore I am not going to list here one more time, if you have any trouble and decided to go through, and need help  let us know
Good Luck
Oz

< Message edited by consultOz -- 15.Aug.2007 9:50:15 PM >

_____________________________

Good luck and Best Regards
Oz Ozugurlu
MVP (Exchange)
MCITP (EMA),MCITP (EA), MCITP (SA),
MCSE 2003 M+ S+, MCDST
Security+, Project+ ,Server+
http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog)

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 8
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Oz!! - 15.Aug.2007 10:04:01 PM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Hello Oz,

Thank you for posting but I still am confused.  I guess what I am trying to say is that I need to know where am I suppose to store the copies of the temp DB files?
Andy said that I needed 110% of the size of the database to run for its temp DB.

Can you or someone tell me what is the best practice for deciding where to store these temp files?  I need your help dearly.  :-)

How can I tell in detail how much space I would potentially claim back from doing the defrag?  You have to talk in lamen terms.  Talk to me like I am a child so I can understand what you are saying here.

I am looking to run this ESEUTIL on Saturday, August 18th and no one in my department is planning on helping me.  I need help and fast!!

Please list what I would have to do, what is the location of where I need to store the DB temp files, and walk me through how I can tell how much space I have on the databases and how much space I can claim approximate.

Thanks everyone!  I am a nervous wreck right now because tomorrow is Thursday and I need some type of direction so I can feel confident I can do this by myself.

You have to be clear and exact on what I need to do.  I can't read between the lines (ha ha)...seriously! 

Thanks again.  :-)

Lena

(in reply to consultOz)
Post #: 9
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 15.Aug.2007 10:04:19 PM   
uemurad

 

Posts: 5489
Joined: 7.Jan.2004
From: California, USA
Status: online 		Lena,

As you can see by the many responses you've received, ESEUTIL is not something to be taken lightly and is not a maintenance application.  It is a last-resort tool to be used when all else fails.  Make sure your director understands this.

That being said, the options relating to defragmentation are listed in this article:
How to defragment with the Eseutil utility (Eseutil.exe)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/192185/en-us

If you haven't already figured it out, Andy's comment about 110% refers to amount of free disk space required to build the defragged files relating to the current size of your EDB and STM files you are hoping to shrink.  You can redirect the output with the switches (read the above article).

Above all, make sure you can restore the EDB and STM files should things go bad.

Most of your questions will be answered if you read the article mentioned above, and also:
How to Recover Hard Disk Space from Exchange Server Databases
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/255035/
quote:

How can I tell in detail how much space I would potentially claim back from doing the defrag?
You can expect to shrink the files by the amount of space displayed in the Application Log entries with Event ID 1221.  You will see one each morning as it reports the results of the online defrag.

I'm curious - how many mailbox stores do you have, and how big are they?  How many stores are you planning to defrag on Saturday?

< Message edited by uemurad -- 15.Aug.2007 10:18:51 PM >

_____________________________

Regards,

Dean T. Uemura
Microsoft MVP - Exchange
exchangeguy.blogspot.com
uemurad@yahoo.com

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 10
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 16.Aug.2007 11:34:01 AM   
totalstu

 

Posts: 124
Joined: 31.May2005
From: Toronto
Status: offline 		Hi, sorry to butt in but I have a related question to running the eseutil defrag.

We have 3 stores, with users split amongst them by mailbox size quotas.  According to the 3 event 1221's I see this morning, store one ( where the big users are) has about 5500mb to regain by running the offline defrag.  The other two stores have about 550mb each to regain.  My exchange drive has about 5.5GB currently free so I'm not in a panic yet.  I'm just wondering what the consensus is on when, and if i should run the defrag.  I did have to run it once a couple of years ago before we put in quotas as I practically ran out of space.  It all worked out fine but I was nervous as heck as this was all new to me.

Thanks

(in reply to uemurad)
Post #: 11
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 16.Aug.2007 1:05:17 PM   
uemurad

 

Posts: 5489
Joined: 7.Jan.2004
From: California, USA
Status: online 		If you've got three stores, you must be running the Enterprise Edition.  5GB is not that much space to recover, and 550MB is definitely not worth it.  What percentage of space does that represent for each store?

Instead of considering the offline defrag, what are your hardware options for expanding the size of your hard drive partition where your stores are kept?

_____________________________

Regards,

Dean T. Uemura
Microsoft MVP - Exchange
exchangeguy.blogspot.com
uemurad@yahoo.com

(in reply to totalstu)
Post #: 12
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003????..Andy Grogan! - 16.Aug.2007 2:06:56 PM   
totalstu

 

Posts: 124
Joined: 31.May2005
From: Toronto
Status: offline 		Hi,

Yes to Enterprise.  If I understand correctly, for the 2 small stores the regained space would represent about 10% of the total stores size.  For the large store it would be about 15%.

Funny you ask about the hardware. I just found out that there will be a project in the fall involving clustering and a SAN.  Once that is done I'll have no real space constraint.  Well, to a point butI think you get what I mean.  So unless one of the stores grows out of control before the project, I don't think I'll need to worry about defragging.

Thanks

(in reply to uemurad)
Post #: 13
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 16.Aug.2007 5:20:52 PM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Hello Dean,

I have 2 storage groups.  I have 3 mailbox stores and a public folder store.  Now this is on the Exchange server. 

One mailbox store is 13769 MB (all as of 5:39 am this morning)
Second mailbox store is 5814 MB
Third mailbox store is 997 MB

The Public Folder store is 10 MB

Now, we also have the Webmail.  Is that something totally different?

Please help!  I am a nervous wreck in trying to understand and put everything together. 

Where am I to store the defragged files temporarily when doing this?

The size on the C: is 67.8 GB total size and 60.6 GB free space.
The size on the D: is 683 GB total size and 592 GB free space.

Can I save files to my C: drive on the Exchange server when I do the ESEUTIL process from the numbers above?

I will be online tonight.  Please watch for me so we can talk and I can learn this quickly.

Thanks again everyone.

Lena

(in reply to totalstu)
Post #: 14
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 16.Aug.2007 6:38:28 PM   
uemurad

 

Posts: 5489
Joined: 7.Jan.2004
From: California, USA
Status: online 		Lena,

First, don't panic.  Everything should be fine.  Everyone responding is warning you against proceeding not because it will cause a problem, but because it might cause a problem (and in our collective opinion is unnecessary).
quote:

One mailbox store is 13769 MB (all as of 5:39 am this morning)
Second mailbox store is 5814 MB
Third mailbox store is 997 MB
These are very small databases (your largest is 13GB and you have nearly 600GB of free space).  I've got mailbox stores with whitespace taking up more disk space and I have no inclination to run an offline defrag.

Again, I have to question why this is being done.  You cannot possibly recover much space.  To check, on your Exchange server open up the Event Viewer (either Start-->Run and enter eventvwr or right click on My Computer and select Manage).  Click on the Application Log then select View-->Filter.  Enter 1221 in the Event ID field and click OK.

What you'll see is the results of each night's online defrag for each mailbox store.  Open up one of the events and you'll see how much whitespace was collected.  This is roughly the amount of space you could recover by running an offline defrag.
quote:

Now, we also have the Webmail.  Is that something totally different?
Webmail (Outlook Web Access) is just an access point.  It doesn't take up any disk space.  The mailboxes you access are the ones on the server in question here.
quote:

Where am I to store the defragged files temporarily when doing this?
  You don't have to worry about your storage.  110% of 13GB is 14.3GB.  That means you should have at least that amount free to run the defrag.  You have 40 times that amount.  Often times the offline defrag is run because there is very little available disk space.  In those cases, you want to output to a different drive.
quote:

Can I save files to my C: drive on the Exchange server when I do the ESEUTIL process from the numbers above?
No need - you can allow them to write to the D: drive.  The only issue is if you are short of disk space, which you are not.
quote:

I will be online tonight.  Please watch for me so we can talk and I can learn this quickly.
I'll check later.

I am really curious what your director is expecting.  Tell him that by shrinking the database files to eliminate whitespace, he will actually be hurting performance.  It takes a lot more disk activity to grow the database files to accommodate new messages than it does to write them into whitespace. 

_____________________________

Regards,

Dean T. Uemura
Microsoft MVP - Exchange
exchangeguy.blogspot.com
uemurad@yahoo.com

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 15
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 16.Aug.2007 11:05:34 PM   
sabel9579

 

Posts: 462
Joined: 4.Apr.2006
From: USA
Status: offline 		Hi Lena,

First off Dean is right... there really is no reason to panic.  I think we all agree here that unless it is absolutely necessary there should be no reason to run an offline defrag unless you are completely out of disk space.  From what you said you have plenty of space and should not need to worry about a defrag for now.  Perhaps you might want to show your boss this thread and show him/her what other Exchange administrators are saying.  At least you have the backing of others in your industry and perhaps this might persuay a change.

With that being said make sure you take a backup before you start the defrag as if anything goes wrong you can at least restore from the backup. 

I would really push your director to not doing this.  Perhaps he/she just don't understand and you might be able to show them this thread and at least get a better understanding.  What knowledge do they have in Exchange maintenance and administration?  IMO there is no reason to offline defrag a 15GB database.  I have DB's that are 4x that size and its not even in my head to do one.

A few years back I was in the same position as you as I had a boss who had no idea what he was doing and he ordered me to do an ofline defrag to supposedly "improve performance".  I explained reason for not doing it but he did not want to hear about it.  I ended up going over his head to his boss and explaining the pitfalls of what could happen.  Needless to say my boss' boss sided with me and asked my direct boss to come up with a business justification for doing this.  My boss put together this real BS story which when I saw it I simply laughed.  The long and short of it was we didn't do the maintenance thanks to others more knowledgeable at the time than I was who gave me some good guidance.

Best thing to do now is to write everything down and present it to your director.  This way if things do not go as planned you can CYA as best as you can.

Good luck!!

< Message edited by sabel9579 -- 16.Aug.2007 11:06:59 PM >

(in reply to uemurad)
Post #: 16
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 17.Aug.2007 8:12:20 AM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Thank yiou Dean and Sabel9579! 

Thanks to everyone for posting and helping me here.  You all are awesome and I don't know what I would do without you all.  You all are the best of friends to me for helping me and us sticking together as Exchange Administrators.

I will setup a document for my Director and see what she says.  I agree, I don't think we should run this now.

I will keep you all posted.  Look out for me.

Thanks.  :-)

Lena

(in reply to sabel9579)
Post #: 17
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 17.Aug.2007 12:22:47 PM   
Exch2003

 

Posts: 102
Joined: 5.Feb.2007
Status: offline 		Hello Dean or Anyone,

Well, I sent out an email articulating what you and the others suggested to me.  My Director still wants me to do the ESEUTIL tomorrow.  She said that she does not want me to do it for gaining space, BUT she wants me to do it because on June 6, 2007 I had all the 1200 emails archived via our Enterprise Vault Server (archival server system).  But our EV server talks with Exchange so just because there were a lot of emails that were archived, would that be a part of the numbers I submitted to you.

I went into my Exchange path in Explorer:
Exchange DB(E):>Program Files>Exchsrvr>MDBDATA folder.  In this folder, it lists our mccj mailbox store.edb of 4,942,088 KB.  The mccj maiibox store.stm is 1,890,312 KB.  Our priv1.edb is 50,550,728 KB.  Our priv1.stm is 19,965,960 KB.  Our pub1.edb is 64,520 KB.  Our pub1.stm is 8,200 KB.  Our CPID mailbox store.edb is 10,861,064 KB.  Our CPID mailbox store.stm is 1,067,016 KB.

Now, when I go to the event viewer on the Exchange Server and look at code 1221, this is what I get:
1)  mccj mailbox store since this morning has 943 MB of free space
2)  main mailbox store since this morning has 13557 MB of free space
3)  CPID mailbox store since this morning has 5782 MB of free space

So, my Director kept saying that priv1.edb is so huge (50 GB).  How does all these numbers relate to eachother?  They are different and I am a little confused.

Can you explain them to me?  Did the archiving of the emails make the priv1.edb file the 50 GB?  Is the priv1.edb my main mailbox store?

Help!!

Thanks.  :-)

Lena

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 18
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 17.Aug.2007 1:05:47 PM   
sabel9579

 

Posts: 462
Joined: 4.Apr.2006
From: USA
Status: offline 		Lena,

First off a 50GB database is not consider huge by any standard as far as I am concerned.  I have seen db's 4x the size of that without any issues at all.  From your event ID 1221 events you would be able to gain back about 13GB space.  I still don't believe this is justification enough to do this.  Remember Exchange will reuse the whitespace first before the db's start growing again.

It seems to me your director is very confused and doesn't understand the ramifications of what you are going to do.  Does she realize your server will be down for an extended period of time?

All  you can do here is state your case.  Other than that do what you have to do :)

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 19
RE: ESEUTIL for Exchange 2003??Dean !! - 17.Aug.2007 1:51:43 PM   
a.grogan

 

Posts: 1887
Joined: 12.Apr.2005
From: London
Status: offline 		Hiya Lena,

When did you have Enterprise Vault installed was it recent or has it been in place a while?

We installed EV about 18 months ago, and we have a archival policy of any item over 3 months old will be submitted to the vault.
I have a number of Exchange databases with one particular store is around 155 GB - which I still consider quite small when compared to others that I have seen.

I do plan to defrag these databases but not for another 4 - 6 months with the main reason being that I am planning some jigging around with the disks and the smaller the databases the better when copying over the network.

The point is, ESEUTIL is a command that does need to be treated with respect and care, please do not use it just yet (as I cannot see the logic that you IT directory is using) as even though I use EV I have not consider it yet - but if you do use it, please ensure that you have a backup to restore from.

Another point of note is that ESEUTIL works at about 9 GB per hour, however this can change depending on the CPU, DISK and Memory available - so expect some lengthy down time - also understand that there will be points where ESEUTIL appears to be doing nothing (or has hung) - please be patient.

I wish you luck,

cheers

A



_____________________________

Andy Grogan
MSExchange.org Forums Moderator
For my general ramblings about Exchange please visit my blog:
W: http://telnetport25.wordpress.com/
M: manifoldmaster@gmail.com

(in reply to Exch2003)
Post #: 20

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