Case Scenario Exercise

You have been hired as an Exchange Server consultant by Fabrikam, Inc., which has a single Exchange Server 2003 server that supports its 1000 users. The server was installed and configured by the former network administrator, who installed Exchange Server 2003 with all the default settings, including the default installation paths. The server has been very unreliable of late, and the new network administrator does not know Exchange Server 2003 well enough to correct the problems. You have been asked to analyze the current server, make changes based on the requirements of management, recommend further optimizations to improve performance and reliability, and implement those optimizations after management approves them. As part of your recommendations, you are asked to consult with the company's users to determine their needs.

You analyze the server and the Exchange Server 2003 environment and find the following:

• The server is a Quad processor system running relatively recent Intel Xeon processors, with 4 GB of random access memory (RAM), and an external Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) hard disk tower with twelve 18.2-GB hard disks. Presently, there is a single 18.2-GB disk configured as the C partition, and the rest is a RAID-5 D partition.

• The server operating system is Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition. The Exchange version is Exchange Server 2003, Standard Edition.

• The single storage group contains a mailbox store that is roughly 15 GB in size.

• Strict storage limits are placed on the mailboxes in the store. Users are warned that their mailboxes are over the limit at 10 MB, and at 15 MB, they cannot send e-mail until they reduce their mailbox size.

• Delivery restrictions prevent messages greater than 1 MB from being sent or received.

• Circular logging has been enabled on the mailbox store.

• Full backups are run on Fridays, with differential backups being performed Monday through Thursday. A couple of times in the past, restores have needed to be done from tape, and both times they were only able to recover to the previous Friday. Management was also frustrated at the length of time it took for the restore and wants to know if next time they can restore e-mail for Sales and Executive Management first, then restore everyone else's e-mail. They would also like the email for these two groups to be backed up twice a day rather than nightly like everyone else.

After talking to users in several business units, you find that the severe mailbox storage limits are causing users to spend a lot of their time managing their mailboxes in an effort to stay under their limits. The delivery restrictions also pose a significant problem for the sales and marketing staffs, which need to have a convenient way to send and receive proposals and ads that are being worked on with clients.

Another common complaint from both the user community and management is that the GAL is inefficient to use with so many entries. They wish there was a way to view the GAL by department.

• Requirement 1 The first requirement is to deal with the server reliability and backup and restore problems. You need to reconfigure the server as necessary for optimal performance and reliability. To accomplish this, you need to make sure you address the problems of the disk configuration, the Exchange Server 2003 software configuration, and the backup plan.

• Requirement 2 You discuss the storage limits complaint with the project manager. She advises you that while management would like to see the limits relaxed so users do not have to continually manage their storage space, they want to keep reasonable limits in place to keep e-mail from getting unmanageable. However, they would like the Sales and Marketing groups to have no storage limits.

• Requirement 3 Because the GAL is currently very inefficient to use, you will need to plan and implement address lists. These will allow users to filter the GAL into more manageable, logical groupings.

Requirement 1

The first requirement involves reconfiguring the server for better performance and reliability, as well as for better backup and recovery.

1. In order to meet management's backup and restore requirements, what part of the current server configuration must be upgraded or reconfigured?

   1. Windows Server 2003

   2. Exchange Server 2003

   3. The C partition

   4. The D partition

2. In order to meet the backup and restore requirements, describe how you would reconfigure the storage groups.

3. Describe the disk configuration for the server that would allow for the optimal level of performance and reliability.

4. Explain why the backup and restore process is not working as intended and what you can do to correct it.

Requirement 2

The second requirement involves configuring different storage limits for the Sales and Marketing groups than for everyone else.

1. Of the 1000 users in the Fabrikam organization, 250 are sales and marketing users. How would you configure the same storage limits for each of the sales and marketing users as efficiently as possible?

Requirement 3

For this requirement, you will need to create address lists for Executive, Sales, Marketing, MIS, HR, Financial Services, and Development.

1. Describe the process that you will use to create the required address lists.

2. There is an existing Executive distribution group in the Exchange organization, and it is configured not to allow anyone except members of the Executive group to send e-mail to it. Management does not want users to be able to use the Executive Address List to circumvent the restriction. How do you prevent users from accessing it?