Hi

I've spent quite a bit of time trying to get my Exchange 2013 environment up and running and I've run into so many issues that just sucked up my time.  I've had to do quite a bit of trawling on the net to get info which would've made my life a whole lot easier if I could have found something a lot more structured. 

So I've put this installation troubleshooter together to assist someone else that might encounter the same problems that I did and will hopefully speed up your installation process and save you some time.

I've used the following guides to assist with understanding how the installation process works but they didn't provide me with any solutions to the problems that I encountered: http://www.petenetlive.com/KB/Article/0000788.htm; Youtube videos

Installed all of the prerequisites
I experienced problems with the DotNet 3.5 installation and went through this article:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/archive/2012/05/14/windows-8-and-net-framework-3-5.aspx

Ran the exchange installation
It failed during the installation - unable to connect to one of my exchange servers
Went through the cleanup procedure in this article - http://memphistech.net/?p=264
Deleted the database from ADSIEDIT-Configuration as explained in the article
Deleted the remnant of the previous installation - "<System Drive>\Default Exchange Install Path"
You will receive the following error if you do not delete the remnant folder: "Couldnt attach the data folder 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\Bin\Search\Ceres\HostController\Data'. Path doesnt contain old nodes belonging to the system 'Fsis'.".

Then ran the uninstallation from Programs and Features and rebooted
Reinstall of Exchange again
I received the following error: "Database is mandatory on UserMailbox. Property Name: Database".
Ran the "get-mailbox -arbitration" which showed which system mailboxes were corrupted.
Deleted the corrupted mailboxes via ADSIEdit-Configuration and recreated them using New-Mailbox -Arbitration -Name lFederatedEmail.4c1f4d8b-8179-4148-93bf-00a95fa1e042 -UserPrincipalName FederatedEmail.4c1f4d8b-8179-4148-93bf-00a95fa1e042@<Default_Accepted_Domain>
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/978776/en-us
The command needs to be run for each mailbox that was deleted

The "Migration.8f3e7716-2011-43e4-96b1-aba62d229136" mailbox was one of the corrupt mailboxes, so after the recreate I had to run:
Set-Mailbox "Migration.8f3e7716-2011-43e4-96b1-aba62d229136" -Arbitration Management:$true
If you don't run this command then you encounter errors with the migration of the mailboxes from one server to the other

Reran the installation and it timed out complaining about not seeing the main DC.
Cancelled the setup and removed installation and rebooted.
Reran the the setup after reboot and everything went through fine.

I hope that this will help ease your road to Exchange 2013.

• Changed type cara chenMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator 8 hours 2 minutes ago sharing

Hi Gavin,

Thanks a lot for sharing the experience of migration Exchange 2010 to Exchange 2013.

Besides, here are some helpful articles about the migration from Exchange 2010 to Exchange 2013.

Upgrade from Exchange 2010 to Exchange 2013

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj898583(v=exchg.150).aspx

Install Exchange 2013 in an Existing Exchange 2010 Organization

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124350(v=exchg.150).aspx

Hope it helps.

Best regards,
Amy