Chris’s Blog

Now that Exchange 2010 has been officially launched and made available, I’m sure many organisations are already thinking about or planning their deployment. I my opinion, this will be especially true for those who still have Exchange 2003 deployed.

Microsoft have once again stepped up and just when you thought they’ve outdone themselves, they announce the release of the Exchange Server 2010 Deployment Assistant. This awesome tool is a result of feedback from the early adopters of Exchange 2010 and of course Microsoft wanting to help streamline the experience of deploying Exchange 2010.

The current version offers the Upgrade from Exchange 2003 scenario.Once the deployment scenario is selected, you are taken through a series of questions and then presented with a list of steps to complete. Each step has a huge amount of valuable information to guide you through your deployment.

Additional scenarios will be available in early 2010, these include:

• Upgrade from Exchange 2007
• Upgrade from Exchange 2003/2007
• New installation of Exchange 2010

The Exchange Server 2010 Deployment Assistant can be found here

Kevin Allison, GM Exchange Customer Experience announced on the Exchange Team blog yesterday that Microsoft will be releasing an update for Exchange 2007 enabling full support of Windows Server 2008 R2.

Microsoft had earlier decided not to update Exchange 2007 to support its latest server operating system, Windows Server 2008 R2. This change is a result of customer feedback, so all I can say about it is thanks for listening!

Microsoft have announced that the new high availability feature of Exchange 2010, namely, Database Availability Group, or DAG will be available in Exchange Standard edition. This is yet another great way they are helping make high availability affordable and appealing to smaller customers.

It is also worth mentioning though that since a DAG makes use of Windows Failover Clustering (WFC) included with Windows Server 2008 Enterprise edition, this Windows Server edition is still required.

For more info see this UC Blog post

For more info on DAG’s, click here