 |
 | Home | Contact Us | FAQ | Search & Site Map | Link to Us |
 | Sign In | Join | Other 45 Sites in Network |
Windows Server Forum / Small Business Server / SBS 2000 / November 2007SBS 2K corrupt(?) mailboxes
All, Is there a way to 'compress/re-index' a single mailbox in Exchange 2000? Using POP to grab email into OE on a Client PC, and get many errors. Also, on another PC (using Outlook 2000) there are some emails which cause Outlook to lock-up/freeze if you try to delete them.. Even leaving machine for a number of hours, it doesn't come back from egg-timer. Have to Ctrl-Alt-Del out of it. Have had (in recent past) problem of hitting 16GB limit, but Eseutil has cured the problem. - Plus educating Users to NOT use Outlook as a file- store for large attachments! TIA, Phil Partridge. Philip Partridge Theres not much you can do to a single mailbox in Exc 2k And why are people connecting to Exchange with OE... The fact of the matter is that they have an OS that is almost 8 years old and needs to be updated This would be a perfect candidate for SBS 2003 with Software Assurance so they can get the next version for free next year. And they won't run into this 16 GB limit  SignatureCris Hanna [SBS-MVP] --------------------------- MVPs do not work for MS. Please do not contact me directly regarding issues. All, Is there a way to 'compress/re-index' a single mailbox in Exchange 2000? Using POP to grab email into OE on a Client PC, and get many errors. Also, on another PC (using Outlook 2000) there are some emails which cause Outlook to lock-up/freeze if you try to delete them.. Even leaving machine for a number of hours, it doesn't come back from egg-timer. Have to Ctrl-Alt-Del out of it. Have had (in recent past) problem of hitting 16GB limit, but Eseutil has cured the problem. - Plus educating Users to NOT use Outlook as a file- store for large attachments! TIA, Phil Partridge. Philip Partridge > Theres not much you can do to a single mailbox in Exc 2k > And why are people connecting to Exchange with OE... [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > Assurance so they can get the next version for free next year. > And they won't run into this 16 GB limit Hi Chris, New Server over Christmas / New Year.. But need to do something now. - One suggestion was delete mailbox (having exported to 'pst') then re-create. How does that sound? I think the problem stems from them trying to use GFI Mail Essentials mail archiving (not the proper GFI archiving tool).. This created a 10GB SQL database, ate what little disk-space they had, and made the job of running eseutil a PITA! - Had to move things to a USB disk to get enough space. Dead slow on USB 1.1. To delete a mailbox; It has to be done from User Manager, I believe? Then purge mailbox store. - Is that right?? Thanks, Philip Partridge For the OL 2000 and OE clients, can you use Shift-Delete (rather than a just Delete) to remove the bad mail from the mailboxes? SignatureMerv Porter [SBS-MVP] ============================ >> Theres not much you can do to a single mailbox in Exc 2k >> And why are people connecting to Exchange with OE... [quoted text clipped - 22 lines] > Thanks, > Philip Partridge >For the OL 2000 and OE clients, can you use Shift-Delete (rather than a just >Delete) to remove the bad mail from the mailboxes? Merv, There seem to be two differing 'faults'. - Am not on site so bear with me.. Outlook 'locking up' on certain messages, is on PC's which the Users are using.. There are (at least) 2 machines where this is happening. - I can try Shift-Del when next onsite.. OE grabs mail on the Server (POP) from exchange, these are the un- deliverables this gives over 100 errors, where it can't find the mail item.. Message number 1 could not be retrieved. Account: 'Administrator'. Server: '10.0.0.2'. Protocol: POP3. Server Response: '-ERR Access denied.', Port: 110, Secure(SSL): No, Server error: 0x800CCC90, Error Number: 0x8004420CD Any ideas? Philip Partridge Do you have antivirus software on the SBS server that scans incoming mail before it gets to Exchange? I suspect the problem may be malformed mail or mail that contains a virus or other problem. You may want to try using OWA to access that Exchange mailbox (the one OE pops) and see what's going on. SignatureMerv Porter [SBS-MVP] ============================ >>For the OL 2000 and OE clients, can you use Shift-Delete (rather than a >>just [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > Any ideas? > Philip Partridge hi Phil, Jumping in here a bit late but I've seen something similar on a SBS2k box. It was a problem with the Exchange store and it my case, it was caused by the RAID array firmware and BIOS. The symptoms are similar - there're some emails which are unable to open, and Outlook appears to lockup. In my case, most times the email subject appears to be spam, reported as several hundred MB! And Outlook eventually recovers, saying there's a problem retrieving. I didn't try OE/POP but since the email can't be retrieve I wouldn't be surprised about the errors. That SBS box was also using POP Connector, but am unsure if there's any connection. I concur with Merv's thinking it's a malformed mail or something interfering with the Exchange store. Can you provide some specs on the hardware? CPU, RAM, storage size partitions and RAID (if any)? For a solution, use an isolation strategy. You may have to consider disabling GFI temporarily. For antivirus, ensure you exclude the Exchange store folders and use one that is VAPI compatible. Use ESEutil over several passes to find out what might be wrong, fix as the clues indicate. In my case, I eventually used the DR recovery method, and it was fixed though the problem returned after a while - since it was due to a h/w error. IMO, using the PST method won't work because the corrupt file won't be retrieved to a PST, and when you restore the PST to the rebuilt Exchange the mail would occupy more space (since this would defeat single-instance store) and your box does sound 16GB space challenged. But no harm to try to create PSTs if you have the time. HTH, Eugene Tan SBS MVP ================================ >>For the OL 2000 and OE clients, can you use Shift-Delete (rather than a >>just [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > Any ideas? > Philip Partridge >hi Phil, > [quoted text clipped - 37 lines] >Eugene Tan >SBS MVP Eugene, Thanks for the input.. This may be due to a change I had instigated to ease my life.. Had a pair of 35GB disks fitted to put the Exchange store on (simple mirror, low level, OS does not know about it). - This seemed the most expedient way to; a) Get enough free disk space for running Eseutil. b) mirrored, as the tape sub-system is not big enough (even with compression) to backup Data + Exchange. I know I am only protected from a disk failure, but better than the nothing of before! I am not sure if the problem started before the new disks were fitted.. Eseutil -d, I can do in my sleep now! ;-} I admit the other options (well Eseutil generally) are 'black magic' to me.. so far the -d option has been fine to claw back some extra space. - Also have the registry tweak in there foe if I need the store to go to 17.5GB.. Had to do this to get an important email on one occasion, but I know it is not a good thing to rely on. What switches do you suggest I hit it with, and what do they do / mean? Thanks again, Phil Partridge. >================================ >>>For the OL 2000 and OE clients, can you use Shift-Delete (rather than a [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] >> Any ideas? >> Philip Partridge Philip Partridge hi Phil, I'm not sure if I understand correctly the reason for the new disks. A pair of 36GB SCSIs for Exchange provides good I/O and RAID1 is helpful for a mission critical function that email is. But it is not necessary for ESEutil - the temp drive/folder for this can be any other drive, preferably not USB, and a different drive often gets some performance benefit though only during this troubleshooting. Since you're not sure the problem occured before or only after you move the mail store to the new drives, you'll probably want to deal with all the suspects. It could be another app interfering like GFI. I've also found that low-end RAID controllers can cause trouble esp. those that don't have their own cpu. What are you using? Exchange2000 is limited to 16GB. The registry tweak to temp increase the size is meant for recovery only, it resets back to 16GB when you reboot. Don't leave in this state unless you are prepared to have an unrecoverable store. As a guide, watch how fast the store grows each week, and leave at least a 2 month buffer. Generally, alarms bells went off whenever the store exceeded 13.5GB. Since the store is damaged, it also needs to be fixed. ESEutil -d only defrags. ESEutil /? to find out the other options. In repairing an Exchange store, there's probably quite a lot to grasp so pls read before you use any of the tools. You'll use some of the tools to identify where errors may exist, and note that it doesn't necessary fix everything in 1 go/pass. Before you do any of the following, I'd advise you make a copy of all of the files of the Exchange store - a IDE/PATA/SATA drive would suffice, which could later also serve as a fast but low reliability backup. I forgot to include references earler. We're looking mainly at the first half of this KB313184: How to recover the information store on Exchange 2000 Server or Exchange Server 2003 in a single site http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313184/en-us How and when to manipulate Exchange transaction logs in disaster recovery http://support.microsoft.com/kb/812592/en-us XADM: STM Database Files Are Inconsistent After You Run the Eseutil /p Command http://support.microsoft.com/kb/327346/en-us And something to read about for 3rd party products working with Exchange: Microsoft support policy for third-party products that modify or extract Exchange database contents http://support.microsoft.com/kb/904845/en-us HTH, Eugene Tan SBS MVP ============================= >>hi Phil, >> [quoted text clipped - 92 lines] > > Philip Partridge >hi Phil, > [quoted text clipped - 53 lines] >Eugene Tan >SBS MVP Thanks for the extra info.. Lots to read up, and need to do things out of hours, so will be a day or so before I get back to the group.. Thanks again, Phil Partridge. >============================= >>>hi Phil, [quoted text clipped - 93 lines] >> >> Philip Partridge Philip Partridge >>hi Phil, >> [quoted text clipped - 60 lines] >Thanks again, >Phil Partridge. New disks were to give room to run a defrag.. No space on the rest. So far, so good.. Eseutil /mh shows clean shutdown on both pub and priv. >>============================= >>>>hi Phil, [quoted text clipped - 95 lines] > >Philip Partridge Philip Partridge Right, I will try to answer these points in a little more detail.. >>>hi Phil, >>> >>>I'm not sure if I understand correctly the reason for the new disks. The server has a small (10GB) C: partition. Mdbdata was on the data partition, and there was not a lot of free space.. Adding the extra disks gave me space to defrag (without moving data, USB1.1, slow!) and tapes not big enough to backup data and exchange, so mirror better than nothing. - Not much I know. >>>A pair of 36GB SCSIs for Exchange provides good I/O and RAID1 >>>is helpful for a mission critical function that email is. [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] >>>I've also found that low-end RAID controllers can cause trouble esp. >>>those that don't have their own cpu. What are you using? Onsite later today, so will get as much detail as I can.. OS doesn't know about the RAID, done at a lower level. >>>Exchange2000 is limited to 16GB. The registry tweak to temp >>>increase the size is meant for recovery only, it resets back to 16GB [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] >>>at least a 2 month buffer. Generally, alarms bells went off whenever >>>the store exceeded 13.5GB. Sorry, I was not clear on this.. Only used to 'get at' the db, not using all the time. 13.5GB luxury! After defrag last night; priv1.ebd = 10,137,640 priv1.stm = 4,523,232 pub1.edb = 1,184,840 pub1.stm = 8,200 >>>Since the store is damaged, it also needs to be fixed. ESEutil -d only >>>defrags. ESEutil /? to find out the other options. [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] >>>Server 2003 in a single site >>>http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313184/en-us Stopped Information Store.. Eseutil /mh reported 'clean shutdown' on both databases. - To me this is not the same as 'consistent' as stated in the KB. Is this OK or not? >>>How and when to manipulate Exchange transaction logs in disaster recovery >>>http://support.microsoft.com/kb/812592/en-us >>> >>>XADM: STM Database Files Are Inconsistent After You Run the Eseutil /p >>>Command >>>http://support.microsoft.com/kb/327346/en-us What should tonight's task be? Eseutil /p ? Eseutil /r ? KB also mentions Isinteg. - Should I run this. This is all a bit scary! ;-) Thanks for any feedback, Phil Partridge. >>>And something to read about for 3rd party products working >>>with Exchange: [quoted text clipped - 118 lines] > >Philip Partridge Philip Partridge hi Phil, As there're several possible causes, it's helpful to use an approach that could eliminate possibilities. Defragging the store does't fix corruption but helps to free up space. If you fix the corruption and it recurs, this is indicates that something else is contributing to the problem. Consider the possible causes of the problem. Hardware RAID which is transparent to the OS is good, but is the h/w fast enough or are there no issues with it? If there are, it may not show up with files, but it may occur on databases such as Exchange. And the problem will still recur after repairing. Since you're using some archiving software, is it possible to temporarily disable or uninstall? Clean shutdown means consistent. It doesn't mean the store has no problems. Try to understand what each process is trying to check and accomplish, don't just follow. I know there is much to grasp. The KBs provide an overview and some background. Do you still have the problem email(s) that can't open? Can it be deleted? Use Isinteg to check for problems in the database. You may need to run several passes (use a few times). Again, make a backup of the original files because you may need to restart alternate repairs with this set. If this fixes the issues, then you're good to go. You'll know if you mount the store and the bad files are gone. Eseutil /p is a 'hard' repair - it dumps data in the logs not yet committed to the store. But it helps fix the store by ignoring what was not comitted. You need Isinteg to fix problems ESEutil /p causes. Use this step if the above doesn't solve the problem emails. The bad emails may still appear but you shd be able to delete them. HTH, Eugene Tan SBS MVP ================================ > Right, > [quoted text clipped - 236 lines] > > Philip Partridge Eugene, Thanks for time and patience! >hi Phil, > >As there're several possible causes, it's helpful to use an approach that >could eliminate possibilities. Agreed. >Defragging the store does't fix corruption but helps to free up space. >If you fix the corruption and it recurs, this is indicates that something >else >is contributing to the problem. I understand this, but it helps my peace of mind to know I have the space. >Consider the possible causes of the problem. >Hardware RAID which is transparent to the OS is good, but is the h/w >fast enough or are there no issues with it? If there are, it may not show >up with files, but it may occur on databases such as Exchange. And the >problem will still recur after repairing. I don't think this is the problem.. Won't know until it is 'fixed' and re-occurs. >Since you're using some archiving software, is it possible to temporarily >disable or uninstall? Yes. This was the GFI Mail Essentials (not very good) archive.. The Administrator account on the Server uses OE to allow me to go through all the undeliverable email. The email retrieval for the first 400+ messages fails with previous error message.. One entry per msg. in Event Log as well. This has been stopped. - Could it be GFI was 'stripping' msgs. from the Exchange store? I will see if the number of irretrievable messages now stays stable. >Clean shutdown means consistent. It doesn't mean the store has no problems. >Try to understand what each process is trying to check and accomplish, >don't just follow. I know there is much to grasp. The KBs provide an >overview and some background. GRR! So why doesn't the KB say 'State will say clean shutdown if the db is consistent'. - It's only obvious if you already know! ;-) True, there is much to grasp, but Client needs a 'fix'. - Haven't got time / money to spend a ?month? on courses to become an Exchange expert. Well not this year anyway. >Do you still have the problem email(s) that can't open? Can it be deleted? Yes. On other Client machines the problem is still there. - These are not the oldest emails, so I do not think this is due to GFI. Could it be the anti-virus software? - CA InoculateIT. It is old, but still updates, and appears to be effective. >Use Isinteg to check for problems in the database. You may need to run >several passes (use a few times). Again, make a backup of the original >files because you may need to restart alternate repairs with this set. >If this fixes the issues, then you're good to go. You'll know if you >mount the store and the bad files are gone. Right, need to find correct format of command-line for this.. Has been suggested I use -test switch, to see if it finds anything, before committing to making changes. >Eseutil /p is a 'hard' repair - it dumps data in the logs not yet committed >to the store. But it helps fix the store by ignoring what was not comitted. >You need Isinteg to fix problems ESEutil /p causes. >Use this step if the above doesn't solve the problem emails. >The bad emails may still appear but you shd be able to delete them. I am worried about KB saying that single instances will be lost, and DB will grow etc. Re-read your last five lines, forgetting all your knowledge (except what is in KB313184)! - That is sort or where I am. PRECIS Have errors. DB's are 'Consistent'. Have defraged to make sure I have space. Now madly reading up, trying to find an 'idiots guide' to fixing without messing up. Many thanks, Phil Partridge. >HTH, >Eugene Tan >SBS MVP > >================================ Philip Partridge > Eugene, > [quoted text clipped - 98 lines] > > Philip Partridge Maybe you should consider a professional Data Recovery service such as Sherlock Data Recovery . They are also knwon as Atomic Bytes and they handle: Apple Imac , Windows and Linux systems. I know they specialize in Exchange Server recoveries so you may want to seriously consider them especially since they only charge if they have a successful recovery or at least that is what I know from past experience. They have a website at: http://www.SherlockDataRecovery.com hi Phil, I know how you mean, I have been in the same situation wondering if I'll make things worse. To mitigate against mistakes, make a copy of the Exchange store and all the transaction logs. This way, you can roll back by restoring the original files. Just make sure you don't copy in the wrong direction!! Given today's HD sizes, this shdn't be an issue. I don't know if GFI is causing issues. May need to check with their tech support. As for the AV, make sure you exclude the folders where the store's files are, among a few other locations. If the remaining HD space is so small, that would not be a good idea. I'd ensure there is way ample space left where the - at least double of what I need (at least spare 16GB). I'd set the temp folders to another drive - the USB or other drive. Isinteg is useful to find out what possible issues exist in the DB. The KB mentions which options to use, and the help is useful enough. Typically, you'd need to run through several passes. The feedback will give an idea what to expect. You might lose some data, but then those were probably gone anyway. The idea is to get the store back to a working condition, otherwise new stuff that come in could get corrupted too. Finally mount the store and see the results. If that doesn't work, you need to restore the files, and try using ESEutil/p and use the approach mentioned in the KB. HTH, Eugene Tan SBS MVP =========================== > Eugene, > [quoted text clipped - 99 lines] > > Philip Partridge |
Reply to this Message |
 Sign In
 Join
 My Latest Posts My Monitored Threads My Blog My Photo Gallery My Profile My Homepage Start New Thread Enable EMail Alerts Rate this Thread
|
©2009 Advenet LLC Privacy Policy - Terms of Use
This website includes both content owned or controlled by Advenet as well as content owned or controlled by third parties.