Veritas BE + Exchange 2003 question

[Mr. Baz]

When assigning the backup selections, is it necessary to backup user mailboxes AND the information store? OR can I do just one and not the other?

Here is my problem: For some reason the BE engine is kicked offline and the backup keeps going (automatic cancellation won't work with BE engine offline).
The only thing in the logs shows that it had problems when it got to the Exchange Information Store.
BE can backup everything else. I had an employee do some research on it, and he says everything he found pointed to the Information store being corrupted....yet everything seems to be running just fine.
Should I run the ESEUTIL later anyway?

This is Veritas BE v. 9.1 rev 4691

Edit: Haha. I'm an idiot. After some research I found my answer.

 

[da sponge]

You're licensed for an exchange agent with BE, correct? I just do the infostore backup on my 2k3 server - it's faster. I've only needed to restore a mailbox once, and for that I've used OnTrack PowerControls to extract it from the tape.

It couldn't hurt to check the database with eseutil (/g i think), just don't run a repair on it without considering the consequences (repair does not leave it in a production ready state).

edit: what was the answer?

 

[Mr. Baz]

You're licensed for an exchange agent with BE, correct? I just do the infostore backup on my 2k3 server - it's faster. I've only needed to restore a mailbox once, and for that I've used OnTrack PowerControls to extract it from the tape.

It couldn't hurt to check the database with eseutil (/g i think), just don't run a repair on it without considering the consequences (repair does not leave it in a production ready state).

edit: what was the answer?

Basically backing up the mailboxes does literally that. Restoring an individual mailbox is easier this way.

Backing up the IS does everything, including all mailboxes, public folders, etc. It does a literal backup of the priv1.mdb and pub1.mdb database files.
So technically, you could get away with doing JUST the IS (like you mentioned). It would just be a little bit more dificult to restore a single mailbox.

 

[versello]

An article was written about backing up the IS vs individual mailboxes... basically what it boiled down to was:

1. Individual mailboxes takes much longer.
2. Backup size is increased.
3. Mailbox backup is not very reliable.

I prefer sticking with Information Stores. If you had to, you could use Exchange 2003's RSG to restore an individual mailbox, without having to dismount a production store.

 

[da sponge]

An article was written about backing up the IS vs individual mailboxes... basically what it boiled down to was:

1. Individual mailboxes takes much longer.
2. Backup size is increased.
3. Mailbox backup is not very reliable.

I prefer sticking with Information Stores. If you had to, you could use Exchange 2003's RSG to restore an individual mailbox, without having to dismount a production store.

That's exactly where I was coming from with my post.