MM&M UG UK

Hi,

I am trying to implement a Disaster Recovery/BCP environment for my company.
We currently have 3 DCs and one Exchange Server Enterprise Edition running on one of the domain controllers.

My BCP plan entails recreating the AD/Exchange environment on a single computer (with an entirely different machine).

I have run through the process on a couple of occasions with variant errors and issues.

The process I have followed is:
Restore System state to the machine from the Exchange server, to effectively mimic the old machine and take over from it
Seize FSMO roles from previous DCs (Global catalog etc)
Metadata cleanup to remove all traces of previous DCs
enable Burflags to d2 - to enable Netlogon/sysvol shares etc
Troubleshoot/resolve DNS (using DCdiage with relevant switches).

Then for the exchange part recovery I have been running setup with the disasterrecovery switch.

So far I have run through the process twice and tried to document as much of the process as possible.
On the first occasion I managed to get as far as restoring the Exchange installation, however had problems with
mounting the database, no matter what eseutil options I used I kept getting errors relating to the MAPI session
"The MAPI call 'OpenMsgStore' failed with the following error:
The Microsoft Exchange Server computer is not available.  Either there are network problems or the Microsoft Exchange Server computer is down for maintenance. The MAPI provider failed." amongst other errors.

As it was the first run I proceeded to reformat and start again, with a more recent systemstate/exchange backup.

On the second occasion I couldnt run the Exchange disasterrecovery and kept getting "fatal setup error has occured"
The eventlog.txt in the temp directory had entries as below:

setup.exe: ***ERRORLOG EVENT*** : ModuleID not found in map in GetSetupComponentByModuleID() -- [{DA943894-7A14-4FFF-BBDC-C004FAE2310B}]
[04/25/08,12:22:20] setup.exe: ***ERRORLOG EVENT*** : ModuleID not found in map in GetSetupComponentByModuleID() -- [{94B7AD3E-0B63-42AC-A542-082ED1F78787}]
[04/25/08,12:22:20] setup.exe: ***ERRORLOG EVENT*** : ModuleID not found in map in GetSetupComponentByModuleID() -- [{ECD1A63D-DBAF-442C-BF46-904364A96B00}]

and

[04/25/08,12:23:47] setup.exe: ***ERRORLOG EVENT*** : Run() : RunLoadSetup(), an exception has occured.

The Exchange Server Setup Progress.log had the following entry at the end
 
" CComBOIFacesFactory::QueryInterface (f:\titanium\admin\src\udog\bo\bofactory.cxx:54)
           Error code 0X80004002 (16386): No interface.
"
My questions are:

To implement a BCP Plan that effectively replaces a 3 DC/Exchange set up with a single DC/Exchange setup are there any recommended best practices other than those covered above?

Are there any obvious mistakes/causes for the error messages I have been receiving?

Any assistance would be much appreciated.

Best regards

Rashid

Hi,

This is probably not what you want to hear, but:

You have picked one of the most difficult DR scenarios! Having Exchange on a DC is not recommended (yes it does work and yes for small shops it can be useful).

It is not recommended in my book at least, becasue DR can be a nightmare.

If I were you, I would consider not making the Exchange server a DC. At this point that would mean building a new Exchange server, becasue you can't DCPROMO a server with Exchange on and expect Exchange to still work afterwards.

At that point you would have 2 DCs and 1 Exchange server.

I would then consider creating a virtual domain controller and using that for your system state backups. That means that hardware will not be an issue when you come to restore. Having separated the to servers, you should be able to get AD up and sorted without Exchange complicating things and then bring the Exchange server back on another box.

Cheers

Nathan

---

Nathan Winters - MVP Exchange Server
MCSE & MCSA 2000 & 2003 + Messaging, MCITP Exchange 2007, MCP, VMWare VCP v2 & v3.

Welcome to the Microsoft Messaging and Mobility User Group: http://www.mmmug.co.uk

Hi Nathan,

Thank you for your response.

I believe you, it is an absolute pain trying to do it this way.

Well the good news is there has been a change and hopefully I will be able to build a full blown disaster recovery environment off site with replication to our main office.

The idea is I have one or two servers on a separate location one with AD replication to our main office and the other with Exchange System Manager only (or one box with both functions).  That way if there is a disaster I can promote one machine to full FSMO roles and build Exchange and do the disaster recovery.

Any suggestions on resources for how best to implement such a plan, most welcome.

Thanks again Nathan, all the best.

Rashid

Hi,

That's great news!

I would suggest keeping the DC and Exchange separate.

You're right about the DC, keep that replicated as normal with AD replication and then seize FSMOs if there is a disaster.

Exchange wise, if you are considering replication then I would seriously take a look at Teneros. Google it!

http://www.teneros.com/

Cheers

Nathan

---

Nathan Winters - MVP Exchange Server
MCSE & MCSA 2000 & 2003 + Messaging, MCITP Exchange 2007, MCP, VMWare VCP v2 & v3.

Welcome to the Microsoft Messaging and Mobility User Group: http://www.mmmug.co.uk

Hi Nathan,

Thanks again buddy!

Appreciate all your help.

Best regards

Rashid

For DR, and zero backup windows on Exchange take a look at this article;
http://www.networkworld.com/supp/2008/ndc3/051908-howard-rice-cdp-case-study.html
The solution covers Exchange, SQL, Sharepoint etc

Cheers
Carl

Hi,
If you are planning disaster recovery for exchange server then Stellar information System can help you. Its a leading name in data recovery services and they have a software Stellar Phoenix Mailbox exchange recovery software to recover data from MS exchange server. More details can find here: http://www.ms-exchange-server-recovery.com

Thanks