We need to do some database maintenance on a mailbox storeon our Exchange 2007 storage group.We are assuming if we move every mailbox of this particular store, we can then take the cluster resource offline (delete all log files, catalogand databases), then when we restart the cluster resource it will create a brand new database for us. This is what we want to accomplish. Is there any steps that I am missing?Thanks in advanced

You say you want to do maintenance on a database, but then you also seem to suggest you are going to delete the database? Which is it? What type of maintenance do you think you need to preform?Either way, NO this is not how to accomplish either of those tasks. I'm not even sure what resources to provide on the topic of maintenance as I'm not sure what you are actually trying to accomplish. Please provide more detail.If you do in fact want to delete a database see the below link.How to Remove a Mailbox Database:http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb201683.aspxMike Crowley: MCT, MCSE, MCTS, MCITP: Enterprise Administrator / Messaging Administrator

Mike, Thanks for the reply. We are going to move all mailboxes off of one mailbox store, then we just want to recreate the an empty mailbox store. Kinda like we are defragging without taking the whole store down form hours, we use the mailbox move method. The end result would be getting a newly created store.

This action is completely unnecessary and very unorthodox. Exchange maintains itself with online maintenance each night. Offline defrags do not improve performance in any way, they simply (potentially) reclaim disk space. Additionally moving users off of a database to another will likely take longer than an offline defrag anyway.And as for the transaction logs, if you want to flush transaction logs you should run a full backup of the database. Your Exchange-aware backup program will do this automatically.You're asking for trouble taking this approach to managing Exchange. Mike Crowley: MCT, MCSE, MCTS, MCITP: Enterprise Administrator / Messaging Administrator

I understand Mikebut we have one store that is not doingthe online defragand it is growing out of control. This database has been over 2 years. We always have done this in the past. We found doing the mailbox move is better than doing a online defrag, plus at this point we don't have enough drive space to do this. So this method will only work for us. We are in education and a lot of accounts come and go. I must say with Exchange 2003 we had to do this almost every year so Exchange 2007 did improve somewhat. Plus this will minimize our backup windows.I am assuming we can recreate a fresh database by taking it offline, then proceeding to delete all files and then bring the cluster resource back online, this will see no files exist and create all new ones.

I would have a look at this link for some ideas.http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb684903.aspx Andrew Sword, MVP

Exchange 2007 SP has Mailbox Management and Data Enhancements that may assist. Andrew Sword, MVP

If you really want to do this Move-Mailbox & Remove Old Database task, herere some suggestions about the procedure for the database removal procedure (We all know how to move mailbox, so I will skip that part): Before we remove those log files, catalog and database, there are several steps to do on active node: a. Block the replication for the storage group (SG) which database stays Suspend-StorageGroupCopy -Identity "ClusterServerName\SGName" -SuspendComment "Delete mailbox database file" b. Then, dismount the database you want to remove Notes: After you dismount the store, the resource will be offline automatically, we don't need to do it manually c. Remove the database from SG Remove-MailboxDatabase -Identity "Mailbox Database xx" Notes: After you perform "Remove-MailboxDatabase" task , the resource will be removed automatically as well. So, basically, we do anything to resources anyway d. Stop the Microsoft Exchange Search Indexer service temporarily in order to remove catalog file Notes: For removing catalog file on the passive node, we must stop the service on the node as well e. Now, we can remove the physical files on the nodes Notes: Please do not forget the start the search service again after removing the files (My lab: Exchange 2007 SP1 CCR)

I believe what they are trying to do is reclaim white space.The daily exchange maint doesn't neccesairly reclaim all white space in the database.Rather then doing a defrag it is best to create a new database and move all mailboxes to that new database and then delete the old database. Sabo_e is that what you're looking for? BP

Yes, we have one store that I believe was corrupted and the online defrag was not working so we had to re-create it. This has been completed.

Glad you solved the issue, it would be great if the procedure can be shared at here