Archive for October 2011

Microsoft has released Update Rollup 6 for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1 (SP1).
Description of Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1

Download Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1

Cheers,

In Windows Server 8, Hyper-V features are enhanced, improving virtual machine performance and providing a scalable virtualization base for cloud deployments. This table provides a comparison of Hyper-V key features between Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 8.

Hyper-V Features	Windows Server 2008 R2	Windows Server 8
Host Memory	1 TB	2 TB
Logical Processors	64 (Max)	160 (Max)
Guest VM Memory	64 GB (Max)	512 GB (Max)
Guest Virtual Processors	4 per VM (Max)	32 per VM (Max)
Guest NUMA	N	Y
Host Failover Cluster	Y (16 nodes)	Y (63 nodes)
VM Support - Failover Cluster	1000 (Max)	4000 (Max)
Live Migration	Y (serial)	Y (concurrent)
Live Migration (no cluster or shared storage)	N	Y
Live Storage Migration	N	Y

Finally there is a fix!
We are happy to report that a fix for the Exchange Management Console (EMC) issues when Internet Explorer 9 is installed is now available. To be specific, we have talked about this in a previous blog post:

• MS11-081: Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer: October 11, 2011 needs to be installed. This can be obtained from Windows Update or - if you need to download it for local network installation, the packages can be obtained here. Please note that the packages for client and server OSes might be different, depending on what you need. The installation of this package is REQUIRED for proper operation of the EMC hotfix.
• In order to obtain the actual hotfix that resolves the interoperability problem with EMC, you will need to call Microsoft support and request a hotfix. The hotfix package is currently not available for public download, but can be obtained from support engineers, who can get it from internal hotfix servers. When you talk to support, the hotfix that you need to request is for the KB 2624899. Please note that this article is not publicly available at this time either.

I was working with one customer yesterday on backup issue. Customer was taking backup using Windows Server Backup of Exchange Server 2010 but it was failing with error code "2155348010". Checked the application log and found the event 517.

He informed that he is taking backup on USB drive and in Windows Server Backup failure result it was talking about I/O failure. We were taking backup of two entire drive, C drive and E drive.(Windows Server Backup is volume backup)
Restarted the Exchange Server and started taking the backup, but this time we took only system state backup on the server drive and not on the USB drive. Backup started fine without any error.

Started the backup of Exchange Database drive "E" and this time we were taking backup on the USB drive and backup completed successfully.
When you select multiple drive for the backup (using windows server backup) and you are backing up on the USB drive, the chances are that they will fail due to I/O read and write failure.

Note: This is one of the reason why Microsoft doesn't recommend to take backup on USB drive.

If you do not have a choice other than running the backup on USB drive than there one thing you can do. Keep in mind its a temporary option.
1: Take the backup of the database on the server drive.
2: Once the backup is complete, copy the backup file paste it on the USB drive and delete it from the server.

Cheers,

This download includes the Exchange Server Active Directory Schema Reference, which provides information about the changes that Microsoft Exchange Server makes to the Active Directory schema when it is installed.
http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=5401

Cheers,
-Gulab