Re: Restoring emails from .edb & .stm files

From: A.P. (alphapapa_a1_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 05/13/04 

Date: 13 May 2004 12:58:38 -0700

Thanks a lot for the info. Jeff, I just finished retrieving all the
mailboxes last night.

The method i used is almost same as you have stated here, but in my
case is didnt use any of the - LegacyDN or Exmerge utilities. Instead
i used a white paper (.pdf document) downloaded from microsoft's
web-site.. with step-by-step details on how to recover MS Exchange
2000 server. This web-link for that document is as under:
 

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=5216

or

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&familyid=9e52bafc-5c33-46b9-af14-04e4d989ef6b

Let me put a brief description of the procedure, which i used to
retrieve our emails from the MDBDATA( .edb, .stm & log files) folder
of the old server:

1. I used a spare desktop PC (P4 2.2Ghz, 512Mb Ram ,40Gb HDD) as a
test/recovery server. I used a 4-port hub with nothing but this PC
connected to it.
2. Installed Win2k OS (sp4)with default options (but with IIS loaded
as Exchange need it). Make sure you name the server exactly same as
the one, which your exchange store was on ..
3. Then i started adding the active users .. as i didnt care about the
users who already left the company.. Once dont with that , i installed
Exchange 2000 .. and then Ex-SP3 (which i had dowloaded on a CD). I
had read somewhere that Norton AV (Corp.) causes some issues with
exchange restore process.. so i didnt installed any Antivirus . Note
that my server is not connected to the internet.
4. One very important thing in exchange 2000 install is the name of
the exchange "First Organization" .. as i used default name : "First
Organization" first time & the restore bombed... loss of 4 hours of
work..! So, I reloaded exchange .... this time with same name of the
exchange store & server as my original SBS2K server.

MAKE SURE - YOU DO NOT CREATE MAILBOXES FOR THE USERS ON THIS SERVER
YET.

5. Now starts the actual restore process..

* I went to the - exchange system manager and "Dismounted" the Mailbox
and Public folder stores.. Then enabled the database to be owerwritten
by a restore .. (All this steps are shown very clearly in that
microsoft document)

* Next i saved the current MDBDATA folder contents all .edb,.stm and
log files ..(just incase, i had to revert back to them later). and
then replaced them with same files from the backed up copy of the
MDBDATA folder contents.. This took long time as my database was about
10Gb in size.

* Then is went to Exchange system manager and "Mounted" the Mailbox
and Public folder stores.. Once they came up , i could see all the
users and their maiilboxes... But they all had red flags on them, as
they were in the orphaned stage.

* I had to manually "Reconnect" (by right clicking) each mailbox with
the corresponding user from active directory and give it some time to
replicate the settings.

*Then i gave all those users "Administrators" rights, logged off from
admin account and logged individually as each individual user on the
server, opened up their mailboxes and exported their accounts as .PST
file on a seperate folder with individual names.,.. and finally burned
them on CD or DVD (as per the size of the .pst files)

There may be a better way to do the same process.. but this method
worked like a champ for me. Thus i have posted it here.. for benefit
of other fellow admin's.. so they dont have to wait for 3 days like
me.. And most importantly not sending the critical mail store to a 3rd
party (mine had critical company emails, which cannot be send to a
recoverystore or anyone else) and spending tons of money .....

Hope this helps..

Anish Parikh

PS: here is another good link from MS.. which i went thru.
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=6273

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