Remove a Defunct Exchange Server
One of our exchange servers has gone down permanently, and i'm trying to remove it from our site, however after right clicking on the server and selecting all tasks->remove server, i get an error: "The Server <servername> cannot be removed because: - One or more users currently use a mailbox store on this server. These users must be moved to a mailbox store on a different zserver or be mail disabled before uninstalling this server. Facility: Exchange System Manager ID no: c103f492 Exchange System Manager" However, every user has already been moved to a different server. Any clues would be appreciated! Thanks in advance, Daniel Stone
August 30th, 2006 7:17pm

Hi Daniel, Here is a KB that you can step through to find those mailboxes or at least what appears to be mailboxes on that server. Often, it turns out that a mailbox was created but never logged into and its just a matter of removing those attributes. http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?id=279202
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August 30th, 2006 7:59pm

Thank you, that is exactly what happened, a never logged into mailbox had yet to be moved. thanks!
August 30th, 2006 9:10pm

I am getting this exact same error and cannot remove a defunct exchange 2000 server from my system manager.I ran the LDP tool and browsed through the ldap, and the only 2 objects that are part of the old exchange box are SMTP and Microsoft System Attendant. I have rebooted the current echange2003 server, but still no help.Any thoughts?
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December 21st, 2006 5:10am

DId you get any reply ? I'm in the same pain and cannot successfully remove the server Thanks
February 1st, 2007 6:16pm

No reply from anyone. Kinda frustrating
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February 15th, 2007 6:16am

Try to find in SubDomain
April 4th, 2007 10:46pm

I ran into this problem myself this weekend. Using the LDP query tool is actually not nearly as sufficient as doing an advanced search in the ADUC console, as described in the following MSKB article: http://support.microsoft.com/?id=555147In fact that article should be updated to include the c103f492 error code since searching the KB on that code alone returns no hits. In any case, that search found me what I needed and I was able to successfully remove the server via System Manager.
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August 12th, 2007 11:24pm

Excellent tip. I had been using all the other KB methods to find this user, to no avail. I had even been able to delete the mailbox store and public folder store from the server. Very frustrating, so thanks again.
September 24th, 2008 10:17pm

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