2 exhange servers - do I have redundancy
Hello, We have 2 exchange servers in our domain - one is a back end server and the other is the front end. Is there any redundancy if either one goes down, so if the front end goes down can users still access mail? and vice versa? Thanks
August 27th, 2010 7:23pm

Hi, if front is down only MAPI profile will run since they connect to backend, OWA, HTTPS will not work & for redundancy you can add more front-end & have a NLB enabled on these server.And in case of back-end all user will not able to access there mail, for this you can have cluster, have a look inot these article: http://www.petri.co.il/load_balancing_exchange_front_end_servers.htm, for cluster : http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/Implementing-Two-Node-Cluster-Windows-2003-Enterprise.htmlRipu Daman Mina | MCSE 2003 & MCSA Messaging
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August 27th, 2010 7:34pm

Short answer - no. If the frontend goes down, the users can still get email, because Outlook doesn't connect to the frontend server unless it is using RPC over HTTPS. OWA will not work if you are pointing that traffic there. However if the backend goes down then you have no email. If inbound email is being pointed to the frontend server then it will queue there. For redundancy you need to use clustering, or something like DoubleTake or Neverfail. However I wouldn't make any investment in Exchange 2003 now. Look at Exchange 2007 or Exchange 2010 which has much better redundancy capabilities, as clustering on Exchange 2003 is painful at best. Simon.Simon Butler, Exchange MVP. http://blog.sembee.co.uk , http://exbpa.com/
August 27th, 2010 8:15pm

Hi Nazta, Generally speaking, we do not place resources on a FE server, that means, all the mailboxes and public folders information stores in a BE server. So if the front-end server goes down, the users which use Outlook client can still access the mailbox, but the users who use ROH or OWA cannot access their mailbox, because the FE server may authenticate the user and perform some processing on the request before sending it to the BE server when the user choose OWA operation. And you can add some front-end servers and configure Round Robin DNS or Network Load Balancing to implement the redundancy. Here is a nice article for you, you can learnt about the Round Robin DNS and Network Loading Balancing and you can choose the method suits your organization best, Load Balancing Exchange Front-End Servers: http://www.petri.co.il/load_balancing_exchange_front_end_servers.htm If the back-end server goes down, the user cannot access their mailbox, because the mailboxes and public folders information stores in a BE server. And for cluster you can refer the following document. Deploying Exchange Server 2003 in a Cluster: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb123612(EXCHG.65).aspx I am glad to have a further discussion with you if you have any other questions. Best regards, Yang
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August 30th, 2010 11:59am

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