Two exchange 2003 servers in same domain / location

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ken.bontinck@vab.be - 27 Apr 2006 09:42 GMT

Hi,

I had 1 mailserver (Exchange 2003 on Windows 2003, latests sp and
updates), servicing a single domain (lets call it domain.com), with a
smarthost setup (an external company, messagelabs, does all our virus
scanning).

We've bought a replacement server, and because I don't want to move all
400 mailboxes at once, I installed the second server. It shows up fine
in the system manager under my administrative group and routing group
(where the Internet SMTP connector with the smarthost it). The old
server is the master, the new one a member.

Our firewall forwards all mail from an external ip to the old
mailserver, but if I read the documentation correctly, my old
mailserver should automatically relay messages to mailboxes on the new
server, right ? Wrong :(

Now, when I move a mailbox from the old > new server, that mailbox can
send mail, but does not receive mail (it sits in an smtp queue called
newserver.mydomain.com). After several hours I get an NDN with 4.4.7 as
reason (which don't help at all).

Thanks for any help you can provide

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Alaa Alian Al-Ankar - 28 Apr 2006 00:27 GMT

Dear Ken,

from your old server can you check for me these things:

1. can you connect to your new server over port 25 ? to test that , from
command prompt run this command "telnet newexchangeserver 25" and tell me
the resutl.

2. do you have symantec antivirus installed on your old as well as new
exchange server ? if yes can you please check if the Internet Email Server
option is enabled or not ? if yes, please disable it.

waiting for your reply.

Regards

Alaa Al-Ankar

> Hi,
>
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>
> Thanks for any help you can provide

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ken.bontinck@vab.be - 12 May 2006 14:01 GMT

Alaa,

Thanks for answering. I've been out of the office, working on a
separate project, hence the long delay. =/

I'm now back to getting the

1. I can telnet to the new server from my client computer or the old
exchange server. I get the usual blurb :
220 zenbin.vab_servers.local Microsoft ESMTP MAIL Service, Version:
6.0.3790.183
0 ready at Fri, 12 May 2006 14:56:03 +0200

2. No antivirus software anywhere near the mailservers. I've had bad
experience with that too. :-)

I've fiddled with the settings a bit, and by now people within the
organisation are able to mail eachother instantaneously and back and
forth. However, people with mailboxes on the new server cannot receive
external mail (as I said, our firewall NATs the public-ip to the old
server's internal ip, but I'm a bit mystified why the old server
doesn't just hand the mail to the new server (it can accept relays from
the old server, btw)).

Alaa Alian Al-Ankar schreef:

> Dear Ken,
>
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> >
> > Thanks for any help you can provide

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Alaa Alian Al-Ankar - 12 May 2006 22:42 GMT

Dear Ken,

are the two exchange servers are in the same subnet ? same LAN ?

can you go to the properties of your new server and check the Directory
Access tab, check which DC and which GC there are connecting to.

can you please post the NDR message you got here ?

regards

Alaa Alian Al-Ankar
Blog: http://ExchGuru.Blogspot.com

> Alaa,
>
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>> >
>> > Thanks for any help you can provide

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ken.bontinck@vab.be - 15 May 2006 07:29 GMT

Hey Alaa,

They are in the same subnet/LAN and connecting to the correct DC/GC.

But yesterday I found the problem. The default SMTP virtual server on
the original server was set to forward mails to a smart host and used
external DNS servers. Because of this I guess the servers couldn't find
eachother (only internal dns servers know them and have MX records
pertaining to them). Once I removed the smart host (I still have it in
my Internet mail connector), everything works fine.

Thanks for helping. :)

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