moving from Pop to SMTP

[TKE402]

Hi,

I'm currently working on a project to move 50 users from using Outlook as a
Pop client to having an internal Exchange server. Are there any
recomendations on making this transition? I ran a test and these are the
steps I took:

Exported all emails from Outlook Pop to a pst. THen created a new Outlook
profile configured with an internal exchange server. Then imported all emails
from the pst.

Is this the best way to do this? This would mean touching everyone's
computer?

Thanks
TKE402

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Nope, that's not how I would do it at all.

First of all there is no need to export anything; POP3 mail is already
stored in a pst-file.
Second of all, I wouldn't import it on a client machine. When you are ready
to migrate a user, tell him/her to copy their pst-file to a certain location
(which you indicate). Then you can conveniently import them in the right
mailbox. Have users rename their pst-file to their username and you can
automate the entire process without touching a single client.

I'm assuming you'll be implementing Exchange 2007?
See http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2007/04/13/437745.aspx

 

[TKE402]

Thanks for the response.

Correct I left that out, right now all email is going to a pst and it's
stored on a network share when using their Outlook as POP.

No I am installing Exchange 2003

I still don't undertand. Don't you have to configure Outlook to use an
internal exchange server? Therefore would you have to create another profile?
This is something my users can not do. With a new profile there are no
previous emails so that's the reason for the import? Maybe I'm missing
something.

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Correct I left that out, right now all email is going to a pst and it's

stored on a network share when using their Outlook as POP.

Note that connecting to pst-files on a network share is not supported or
recommended by Microsoft. Before importing any of these into Exchange, I
would recommend to scan them with scanpst.exe first to scan them for
corruption. There is no automated way to do this.

No I am installing Exchange 2003

In that case you'll have to use ExMerge in Two Step mode;
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/174197
Depending on the amount of users, this alone would already be a good reason
to migrate to Exchange 2007 instead of Exchange 2003 ;-)

Don't you have to configure Outlook to use an
internal exchange server? Therefore would you have to create another
profile?

Sure, but this doesn't have to be a manual thing. Depending on your
environment you can deploy prf-, msp- or cmw-files to update a client's
configuration automatically.

 

[TKE402]

OK thanks, I will have to do something about their psts

Now you mention "Depending on your

environment you can deploy prf-, msp- or cmw-files to update a client's
configuration automatically."

So far what I have read regarding these files are for new installaions. The
original installations of Office were done manually and all the settings were
choosen manually. How can I use these files to auto create an outlook profile
on an existing installation?

Thanks

TKE402

 

[msnews.microsoft.com]

Hi,

I'm currently working on a project to move 50 users from using Outlook as
a
Pop client to having an internal Exchange server. Are there any
recomendations on making this transition? I ran a test and these are the
steps I took:

Exported all emails from Outlook Pop to a pst. THen created a new Outlook
profile configured with an internal exchange server. Then imported all
emails
from the pst.

Is this the best way to do this? This would mean touching everyone's
computer?

use outlook profiler...

 

[Pat Willener]

Are you sure that you want to import all users' mail into the new
Exchange Server mailboxes? Sooner or later you will have mailbox size
limits, and the users will have to archive their old mail back into an
archive PST file.

I would rather keep the original PST file as an original archive, then
either use this PST file to archive old Exchange Server mail items, or
set up a new archive PST file for that purpose.

I have a PST file that contains all my original mail from an earlier
POP/SMTP setup, and I now use it to archive my Exchange Server mail.
This way I have all my mail messages back to 1997 in one single PST file.

 

[TKE402]

Thanks for the response.

By the looks of their current psts , the size shouldn't be an issue any time
soon. If I keep their current psts as archives then I would have to inform
all the users how to connect to their archive pst. It would be another added
step.

tke402

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Ouch! You might want to correct that as well in the same process when you go
for a managed environment. Depending on your users (and the amount of
users), a redeployment with the correct settings might already be less time
and effort than any other solution. This is especially true when you deploy
updates or any other configuration change later.

Otherwise I would go for the prf-file, instructing the users to double click
on the prf-file to update their mail configuration.