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Minimum High Availability Setup - 25.Jan.2007 9:10:35 AM

RMGreenley

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Joined: 25.Jan.2007
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What is the minimum setup possible for a full 'High Availability' setup? My company has a relatively small user base (100-200 mailboxes with the majority being Average to Heavy users), so we shouldn't need a box for each component of Exchange 2007. I was planning to do a multi-role install with putting everything on one server. At the same time, we want full redundancy on all parts of Exchange so we have no downtime in case of hardware failure. Initially I wanted to do CCR to accomplish this. However upon careful reading of the documentation, it appears that the Hub and CAS portions do not support being run in a CCR setup. Does this mean that my minimum setup for a fully redundant 'High Availability' setup of Exchange 2007 using CCR requires 4 servers (two for the CCR mailbox servers and two separate servers for everything else)? Or is there another way to fully protect our Exchange install that doesn't require buying a 3rd party tool? Thanks in advance for any insight.

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RE: Minimum High Availability Setup - 26.Jan.2007 12:02:27 PM

neilho

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Yep, you can't put HT and CAS on a clustered mailbox server.

It also all depends on your definition of "full high availability". Does that include data center availability? If so, you'd need to consider the 2nd CCR node being located at the 2nd data center, with additional HT and CAS servers located there. It all starts adding up...

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(in reply to RMGreenley)

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RE: Minimum High Availability Setup - 26.Jan.2007 2:27:59 PM

RMGreenley

Posts: 24
Joined: 25.Jan.2007
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Thanks for the reply. My definition of 'full high availability' means that there is no single point of failure. All Exchange services are on redundant machines so if one sever bites the dust another can immediately pick up and the users will have no interruption in service. It sounds like you're confirming what I suspected, and that there's just no easy way to do this without getting a 3rd party application to help. Thanks again for the reply.

(in reply to neilho)

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RE: Minimum High Availability Setup - 26.Jan.2007 7:00:20 PM

neilho

Posts: 727
Joined: 25.Oct.2004
From: UK
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You don't _need_ 3rd party apps, just more servers if you want to remain within the bounds of Exchange. For some, not having additional 3rd party apps is a reason to stick with pure Exchange. And like I said, if you really mean no single point of failure, that would include the data center, right?