Please help restoring Exchange

[Jawloms]

So it appears on my Exchange 2010 SP3 server that one of my databases has become corrupt. My backup process backs up the entire VM using free Veeam. If I restore last nights backup, how do I then get the one database off it and put it on the live server? Google isn't helping as all I can find is about restoring using Windows Backup, but obviously I didn't backup using that. Or am I better off taking the server down now so the people on the working databases don't do much more, and restore the lot? Edited May 19, 2023 by Jawloms

[3s-gtech]

Is your Veeam backup Exchange aware? Or is the backup a simple snapshot of the VM?

 

If it’s the latter, I think you’ll need to restore it to a different VM, check the database integrity, dismount it then transfer it across, reversing the process on your Exchange VM.

 

This is a nervy process! Snapshot and be careful as you go. Whatever caused the IO error may be affecting your host.

[Jawloms]

It isn't Exchange aware, it's literally just a straight backup of the VM.

 

I'm currently restoring it to a different VM, it's just the putting it back in a live server I could do with an article or detailed guidance on.

 

The host wasn't reporting any issues when I checked it earlier. Gonna keep an eye though!

[3s-gtech]

I haven’t used 2010 to be able to guide you further, but I have followed MS guides to do this. It’s Powershell driven. You basically dismount the current DB and mount the one from the backup, but there may be other steps in your environment.

 

It was the stress of this potentially happening again that guided me to finally moving all mailboxes to Exchange Online. My local DB is minimal now.

[Jawloms]

Thanks for your help.

 

I actually have a hybrid setup and was going to move it all up to the cloud, but now MS have switched off basic auth I can't go straight from 2010 SP3 up to the cloud. I have setup an Exchange 2016 server which I intend to use as a stepping stone during a holiday, and then up to O365, but it's not holiday now!

[bknaggs]

Migration between Exchange servers is pretty good. Once a mailbox is migrated the user will get a message to close and re open Outlook and that's all they should see.

[3s-gtech]

Yes, don’t fear migrating them to a new DB on a new box. That’s a great system and works well.

[Jawloms]

In the meantime, what's happening to external emails which are coming in? Will they be being queued somewhere, or will everything believe they have been delivered so we could end up completely missing them?

[3s-gtech]

Do you have the Queue Viewer MMC? That should show you - I’m not sure if that’ll work with a broken MBD but worth a look.

[Jawloms]

My restore has now restored and there are no errors around the disk in the logs, so it looks like the backup was made minutes before the problem started. I've restored it to a different physical server. I'm assuming the option now is to unmount the database from my restored server, copy it to the live server and mount it on there? Is it just the edb file, and is it really that simple??

 

Something which may affect that is that I started running eseutil commands on the live one to try and fix the database whilst waiting for the restore. It's currently doing a defrag which obviously I can't interrupt! I guess I could unmount the SLT database from the live server and move it to my restored one?

Edited May 19, 2023 by Jawloms

[3s-gtech]

I *think* so. Exchange relies on its log files but if you clean unmount the DB, move it across then mount it you should be in better standing.

 

Not sure if you can do any of that in the EAC.

[Jawloms]

Not sure I can clean unmount as my restored exchange can't see AD, so EMC won't work. I'm going to let the defrag finish on the live server and you never know, that may fix it anyway! Failing that, I've now got copies of my backups so I can try various things moving forward.

 

Gah!

[chaplic]

You can't just copy the DB and hope for the best. Theres a CHK file which records which logs are played into the database and which are not, so if you put a old database against an newer chk file all hell will break loose. It's been a very long time since Ive done this but a voice in my back of my head says applying the old database and renaming the check file will cause it check all current logfiles (might take time) and then mount. But I cannot find any reference to that on the internet so use at your own risk

 

Definitely stop exchange services cleanly and take a file copy of the current DB before doing anything, and if it were me I'd not be rushing right now and using the weekend.

[Jawloms]

and if it were me I'd not be rushing right now and using the weekend.

 

I've literally just gone and told SLT I'm off at 4 as normal and will pick it up over the weekend!

[psydii]

This seems to be a method for doing it: https://www.nucleustechnologies.com/blog/methods-to-restore-exchange-database-to-a-new-server/#:~:text=Steps%20to%20Move%20Database%20to%20a%20New%20Server,restore%E2%80%9D%20with%20the%20following%20command.%20...%20More%20items

 

But, since you've already got it mounted on an exchange server... why move it to the old server (which may well have an underlying hardware problem)? Can you not just use this as a brief stepping stone to Exchange 2016/365?

[Moaead]

Hello Jawloms

I saw an old post about lenovo battery issue...

Please can you tell me What are the frameware updates that you made to fix the Lenovo v15-iil battery life issue?

And did that work?

[Jawloms]

It was the trollies which needed the firmware update, not the laptops. Edited June 29, 2023 by Jawloms