Licensed to DAG

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There is some confusion on the licenses required when implementing Database Availability Groups (DAGs). Most of the times the confusion is caused by mixing up the OS license with the Exchange license. The answer is really quite simple.

DAGs use Windows Fail-Over Clustering. Fail-Over Clustering is only available in Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (R2 included). So, each Mailbox Server that is DAG member should be W2k8(R2) Enterprise Edition. Stand-alone Mailbox Servers (i.e. non-DAG) can run on W2k8(R2) Standard Edition. Regarding the Exchange license, you can opt for Exchange 2010 Standard or Enterprise Edition. The difference is the number of databases supported running on one Mailbox Server; Standard Edition can host 5 databases, Enterprise Edition 100.

Thus:

  • DAG functionality?
    • Yes: Windows Server 2008 (R2) Enterprise Edition;
    • No: Windows Server 2008 (R2) Standard Edition.
  • 5 databases or less?
    • Yes: Exchange Server 2010 Standard Edition;
    • No: Exchange Server 2010 Enterprise Edition.

Note that you can upgrade your Exchange 2010 Standard to Enterprise Edition when the situation requires. All that is required is the product key; re-installation is not required (see this TechNet article).

Exchange Pre-Deployment Analyzer

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Today the MS Exchange Team released the ExPDA tool, or Exchange Server Pre-Deployment Analyzer. This tool is meant to scan and analyse your current e-mail enviroment for possible. ExPDA can also be used as an decisionmaking tool, helping you through the process of implementing Exchange 2010.

ExPDA is based on ExBPA – Exchange Best Practice Analyzer – but looks more at the complete topology than at the system level. Amongst many other things, it scans current Exchange (2003, 2007) systems and domain controllers/gc’s for required patchlevels, connectors and domains and forests for required modes in order to implement Exchange Server 2010.

ExPDA runs on Windows 7, Vista SP2, Windows Server 2008 SP2, Windows Server 2008 R2 and even Windows Server 2003 SP2. Check the team’s announcement for more details. You can download ExPDA here.

Forefront Security for Exchange SP2 RU1

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With all these “2010” information you could forget that most customers are still running earlier versions. For people running ForeFront Security for Exchange SP2, Rollup 1 was released yesterday. Besides a new parameter (called feature) for enabling of disabling FSE on a cluster node, RU1 contains no less than 30 hotfixes. For a list of fixes, consult the related knowledgebase article here. You can download FSE SP2 RU1 after submitting a hotfix request here.

Exchange 2010 Mailbox Role Calculator 4.5

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It looks like the Microsoft Exchange Team is working very hard on improving the Exchange Mailbox Role Calculator, because today they released version 4.5 (around 2 weeks after releasing 3.5). This version includes the following changes since 3.5:

  • Included minimum number of global catalog cores in calculation results;
  • Ability to specify different RAID parity settings for Restore LUN;
  • Improved formatted capacity of a disk drive calculation;

Version 4.5 of the calculator also includes several bugfixes; consult the changelog (or should that be changeblog 🙂 ).

Looking at the number of changes and the changes itself I’m puzzled why the Mailbox Storage Calculator suddenly jumped 1 major version (3.5->4.5) where one would expect a minor version update.

You can download the calculator here.

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express

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Today at the Mobile World Congress, RIM announced the BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express (BESE). BESE is positioned by RIM as a free(!) alternative for small to medium sized companies which require BlackBerry’s security and manageability, but don’t require all enterprise funtions. For example, this also means lack of advanced monitoring and high availability options found in the enterprise product. BESE will work with Exchange 2003 SP2, 2007 SP1 and 2010 in combination with Windows SBS 2003 and 2008. Very helpful is the BlackBerry comparison chart you can download here (PDF).

You can read the full press release here. BESE is scheduled for release in March. BESE has its own webpage on RIM’s website here.