Category: Exchange 2010

Exchange 2010

Exchange 2007 & 2010: Current issues with Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and Third Party Devices

The following is a list of current issues observed by Microsoft Support personnel for Exchange Server 2007 and Exchange Server 2010 with third-party vendor devices. If you are using Exchange Server 2007 SP3 or Exchange Server 2010 SP1 and you are experiencing an EAS issue not listed below, contact Microsoft Support Services to investigate the issue.

1. Automatic meeting processing

Issue 1.1 – Recurring meeting is removed from calendar when organizer cancels single occurrence

When you synchronize your iOS device by using Exchange ActiveSync on an Exchange Server 2007 mailbox, if the organizer cancels a single occurrence of a recurring meeting, the device may unexpectedly delete the entire recurring meeting.

Solution

There are two parts to this solution:

Install the Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 3 (SP3) update rollup 4 (RU4). The problem details and the link to the update are documented in the following Microsoft Knowledge Base article:

2502276 A meeting request series are deleted unexpectedly from the calendar in an Exchange Server 2007 environment

Update the Apple iOS on your device to version 4.3 or later. For more details on the latest iOS version, click the following link:

http://www.apple.com/ios

Apple has documented the issue at the following web site:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts3714

Issue 1.2 – Attendee becomes meeting organizer

When you synchronize your iOS or Android device by using Exchange ActiveSync on an Exchange Server 2007 mailbox, you may unexpectedly become the organizer for a meeting that you were invited to. This does not change the meeting for all attendees.

Solution

This can occur if you change the reminder for a single occurrence of a recurring meeting on an iOS or Android device. There may be other property changes to meeting items that may result in the same symptom.

This issue is resolved in Rollup Update 4 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 3. See the KB article below for additional information.

2521063 You are incorrectly displayed as a meeting organizer after you synchronize the meeting by using your mobile device in an Exchange Server 2007 environment

Note Affected meetings must be deleted and replacement meetings must be created after the servers are patched.

Issue 1.3 – Your meeting response to the organizer appears to have been sent by someone else

When you respond to an Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) meeting invitation, the meeting originator may see someone else’s name displayed as having accepted the invitation instead of you.

Solution

Ensure the Apple iOS on your device is version 4.3 or later. For more details on the latest iOS version, click the following link:

http://www.apple.com/ios

This was fixed by Apple in iOS 3.1. For more details, visit the following Apple web site:

iPhone and iPod touch: My replies to Exchange ActiveSync invitations seem to come from someone else

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2806

Issue 1.4 – All Day Flag is not set properly on Mobile devices when meeting is scheduled cross multiple days

Mobile device clients do not treat a meeting request as an all day event meeting request. Additionally, the All Day field is marked with "No".

Solution

This issue is resolved in Exchange 2007 Service Pack 3 Rollup 2. The problem is documented in the following articles from the Microsoft Knowledge Base online:

2201236  The "All Day" field is marked with "No" when you access a meeting request that has a duration time that is more than 24 hours by using a mobile client through ActiveSync in an Exchange Server 2007 environment

2201236  Description of Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 3

Issue 1.5 – Recurring Exchange calendar events deleted

In some situations, recurring calendar events can be removed from both the iOS device and Exchange when the organizer cancels an event instance.

Solution

This issue is resolved by Apple iOS 4.3, and impacts only the 4.2.6 and earlier versions. Apple has documented the issue at the following web site:

iOS: Recurring Exchange calendar events deleted

https://support.apple.com/kb/ts3714

Issue 1.6 – Appointment exceeding 24 hours changed to multiple day All Day Event

When an appointment item’s duration exceeds 24 hours, but is not marked as an All Day Event, Exchange ActiveSync changes the item on the device to become a multi-day All Day Event. The next time that the device synchronizes with the mailbox, the change is propagated from the item on the device to the item on the Exchange Server 2010 mailbox.

Solution

Microsoft is investigating this issue. This problem can occur when using any ActiveSync device synchronizing with Exchange Server 2010.

2. Connectivity and synchronization failures

Issue 2.1 – Failures to Provision and Synchronize with Android OS

EAS policies can cause provisioning and synchronization to fail, when customized. Devices will not be provisioned if a policy is applied to the users of these devices that exceeds these limitations. This is discussed in comment 9 from the following post on Google’s Android forum:

http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=9426

"We only support the basic (EAS 2.5) features in Froyo. So if your server requires, for example, password history or expiration, or complex characters, then it won’t be provisionable in Froyo. Our goal is to provide more policy support in future versions, but for now we support – password (PIN/alpha), minimum characters, max. fails to wipe, inactivity timeout, and remote wipe."

Solution

Updates to the Android OS version appear to resolve this problem. We encourage device users to update to the latest version available from their provider and follow vendor forums on synchronization issues. If the decision is made to allow older devices in the organization, Administrators can canvass device users, or use tools Log Parser or Export-ActiveSyncLog, to ensure that such devices are identified in the organization. Users of older devices can be grouped into a policy that can work for them.

Issue 2.2 – Unable to connect using Exchange ActiveSync due to Exchange resource consumption

There are several symptoms and remediation methods for issues with resource depletion caused by devices connecting with Exchange ActiveSync.

Solution

Administrators should review the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base to determine if they are experiencing the same server symptoms:

2201236  Unable to connect using Exchange ActiveSync due to Exchange resource consumption

Note This article also describes a known issue with iOS 4.0, defined by user agent 801.293 – http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3398 and is discussed in Issue 2.5, below.

Issue 2.3 – "This message has not been downloaded from the server" error when trying to open a message

You synchronize your Exchange Server mailbox with your iOS device. When you try to open a message on the iOS device, the following error may be displayed:

This message has not been downloaded from the server

Solution

You must configure the Accepted Domain using Exchange Management Shell. Use the steps in item #7 in the following post from the Exchange Team Blog:

Exchange 2010 SP1 FAQ and Known Issues

http://blogs.technet.com/b/exchange/archive/2010/09/01/3410888.aspx

This issue is being reviewed by the Microsoft Exchange product team.

Issue 2.4- You receive a synchronization failed email message when you synchronize your mobile device

When you synchronize your mobile device by using ActiveSync on an Exchange Server 2010 mailbox, you receive a synchronization failed email message similar to the following:

From: Microsoft Exchange on Behalf of <user>

Sent: <date>

To: <other user>

Subject: Synchronization with your <ActiveSync device> failed for 1 items.

Synchronization with your <ActiveSync device> failed for 1 items.

Microsoft Exchange was unable to send the following items to your mobile device. These items have not been deleted. You should be able to access them using either Outlook or Outlook Web Access.

Item Folder: Inbox

Item Type: IPM.Schedule.Meeting.Resp.Pos

Solution

This issue is described in the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

2201236 You receive a synchronization failed email message when you synchronize your mobile device by using ActiveSync on an Exchange Server 2010 mailbox

To resolve this issue, install the following update rollup:

2201236 Description of Update Rollup 3 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1

Issue 2.5- Users are unable to synchronize Apple iPhone iOS 4.0 with the Exchange Server mailbox

Immediately after updating to iOS 4.0, some users may notice that Exchange ActiveSync Mail, Contacts, or Calendars do not sync, or sync very slowly. In addition, some Exchange Server administrators may notice their servers running slowly. This problem is also discussed in Issue 2.2, above.

Solution

Update the device to a later iOS version. Apple has documented the issue at the following web site:

iOS 4.0: Exchange Mail, Contacts, or Calendars may not sync after update

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3398

Issue 2.6- ActiveSync does not work for mobile device users connecting to Exchange Server 2007 mailboxes after swapping URLs between Exchange Server 2010 and 2007

This problem occurs because the device is unable to properly redirect a user whose mailbox has been moved. The 451 redirect response to the device is not properly interpreted.

Solution

Typically, this issue is resolved by device updates to the latest operating system. Verify the following:

Verify that you have configured the LegacyURL for Exchange 2007 users. This will automatically switch the URL for the user to the appropriate target on the device. See the following blog topic:

http://blogs.technet.com/b/jribeiro/archive/2009/11/26/transitioning-from-an-exchange-2007-environment-to-exchange-2010.aspx

This has been reported for several device types, to include iOS and Android operating system. If the problem is noted with the latest version of the device operating system, and the LegacyURL is correctly established and working for other devices, consult with the device vendor’s technical support.

If you are using an Apple iOS device, update the device to the iOS version 4.3.2.

Note In migrations where the mailbox moves are between different forests, a 451 is not sent. The reason for this is that the old server does not know of the new endpoint for connectivity. In such circumstances, the device must be manually reconfigured.

Check: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2563324

You cannot close the EMC window on a computer that has Internet Explorer 9 installed

Microsoft released the official fix for: You cannot close the EMC window on a computer that has Internet Explorer 9 installed. Windows Internet Explorer 9 installed, you start the Exchange Management Console (EMC). After you make a change and then try to close the EMC window, the window does not close. Additionally you receive the following message:
image_thumb1

You must close all dialog boxes before you can close Exchange Management Console.

Download: KB2618444 Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer: December 13, 2011

Exchange 2010 SP2 RTM

Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 2 (SP2) has been released, raising the Exchange version number to 14.2.247.5. You can download Exchange 2010 SP2 here.

For those still unaware, the 530Mb+ file (1,4 GB extracted) contains the full set of binaries; you can use it to upgrade existing RTM or SP1 installations or deploy new Exchange 2010 SP2 installations.

Besides the usual set of hotfixes, SP2 introduces the following features:

Address Book Policies
Address Book Policies, also known as GAL segmentation, ABPs are meant to segmentize the address book, giving users a certain view of the address book like Address List Segregation did for Exchange 2003/2007.

OWA mini
This will be a lightweight browser like OMA in the past, meant for simple browsers.

Hybrid Configuration
This wizard is to make the configuration of an on-premise Exchange and Office 365/Exchange Online more simple, reducing the steps required from 49 to 6.

OWA Cross-Site redirection
This will allow clients to be silently redirected to the proper site if they log on to a CAS server located in a site different than the site where their mailbox is hosted and externalURL has been specified there.

After preparing your forest for Exchange 2010 SP2, the schema version number will have changed. Check the Schema Versions page for information on the new ObjectVersion and RangeUpper values for Exchange 2010 SP2.

Note that SP2 introduces an additional requirement, which is the IIS 6 WMI Compatibility feature; you can add this feature using the GUI or by using the Powershell cmdlets Import-Module ServerManager followed by Add-WindowsFeature Web-WMI.

The proper method to upgrade mailbox servers that are a member of a Database Availability Group is described here.

The releases notes are not available at time of writing; we’ll update this post when they become available.

Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1

The Exchange CXP team released Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 SP1 to the Download Center.

This update contains a number of customer-reported and internally found issues since the release of SP1. See ‘KB 2608646: Description of Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1’ for more details.

This update contains a number of customer reported and internally found issues since the release of RU5.

The most Important Fixes:

  • 2627769 Some time zones in OWA are not synchronized with Windows in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2528854 The Microsoft Exchange Mailbox Replication service crashes on a computer that has Exchange Server 2010 SP1 installed
  • 2544246 You receive a NRN of a meeting request 120 days later after the recipient accepted the request in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment
  • 2616127 "0x80041606" error code when you use Outlook in online mode to search for a keyword against a mailbox in an Exchange Server 2010 environment.
  • 2549183 "There are no objects to select" message when you try to use the EMC to specify a server to connect to in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment

Other Fixes:

  • 2431609 An update is available that updates the message of a retention policy in OWA for Exchange Server 2010
  • 2449266 EWS drops the TCP connection to the EWS client application without any error message in a Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2480474 A Users do not receive quota warning messages after applying SP1 for Exchange 2010
  • 2514820 An incoming fax message is not delivered to the recipient in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment
  • 2521927 Disabling the Exchange ActiveSync Integration feature for OWA does not take effect in OWA Premium clients in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2535289 The Microsoft Exchange Information Store service crashes occasionally when you run an antivirus application on an Exchange Server 2010 Mailbox server
  • 2536313 Slow message delivery and mailbox access for journaling mailboxes on an Exchange Server 2010 server
  • 2548246 The Microsoft Exchange Information Store service crashes occasionally when a folder view is corrupted on an Exchange Server 2010 mailbox server
  • 2549289 A RBAC role assignee can unexpectedly run the Add-MailboxPermission command or the Remove-MailboxPermission command on an Exchange Server 2010 server that is outside the role assignment scope
  • 2555851 A mailbox does not appear in certain address lists after you run commands on the mailbox in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment
  • 2559814 A user cannot add or remove delegates from a mailbox by using Outlook in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2561514 Exchange Server 2003 user cannot view the free/busy information of a user in a different federated organization
  • 2563860 You cannot create a new mailbox database if you already have 1000 mailbox databases in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2567409 Certain free/busy messages are not replicated from an Exchange Server 2010 server to an Exchange Server 2003 server
  • 2571791 Retention policies are applied to Contact items unexpectedly in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2572052 Certain properties of a recurring meeting request from external email accounts are missing in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment
  • 2575005 You cannot start the EMC or the EMS in an Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1 environment
  • 2578631 Certain users cannot send email messages to a mail-enabled public folder in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2579172 Items that are deleted or moved still appear in the original folder when you use Office Outlook in online mode to access an Exchange Server 2010 mailbox
  • 2579671 No results returned when you use the ExpandGroup method in EWS to retrieve a list of members of a Dynamic Distribution Group in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2582095 The SmtpMaxMessagesPerConnection property of a send connector is not replicated to the subscribed Edge Transport server in an Exchange Server 2010 environment
  • 2600835 The RPC Client Access service crashes when you delete an attachment of an item by using Outlook in online mode in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment
  • 2601701 The memory usage of the MSExchangeRepl.exe process keeps increasing when you perform a VSS backup on Exchange Server 2010 databases
  • 2617126 The Store.exe process crashes when you send an email message that has attachments in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment

 

General Notes

An issue with management of RBAC roles when RU6 is partially deployed in the organization: Due to changes shipped in this update, certain warnings can be displayed when managing RBAC roles, if RU6 is not yet deployed to all servers in the organization. Please see the following KB article for more information:

Managing RBAC roles might display warnings or errors if Exchange 2010 SP1 RU6 is partially deployed in the organization
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2638351

Note for Forefront users: For those of you running Forefront Protection for Exchange, before installing the update, stop all Forefront services.

Exchange Management Console & IE9 issue fixed

The Exchange team made a fix available a fix to solve the issues when using the Management Console of Exchange 2007 or 2010 in conjunction with Internet Explorer 9.

As you probably know, when using Internet Explorer 9 you can’t close the Exchange Management Console properly as it gives you the error “You must close all dialog boxes before you can close Exchange Management Console” having no dialogs open.

To solve this issue, you had to use the Task Manager to force closing the EMC process using

To properly install the hotfix:

  1. Request hotfix ID 2624899 from support here. For a direct download link click here.
  2. Download and install MS11-081 (2586448). You can retrieve this update here.
  3. Install the hotfix ID 2624899.

Microsoft states it expects to incorporate this fix in a future update of Internet Explorer 9.

While releasing a fix for the IE9 issue is great after all these month, I can’t help but wonder why the fix has not been made public.

Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Performance on vSphere 5

A white paper has been published that examines how Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 performs on vSphere 5 in terms of scaling up (adding more virtual CPUs) and scaling out (adding more VMs). Having the choice to scale up or out while maintaining a positive user experience gives IT more flexibility to right-size system deployments and maximize total cost of ownership with respect to licensing and hardware purchases.

Testing shows the effectiveness of vSphere 5 to add compute power by scaling up Exchange Server VMs, in increments, from 2 to 12 virtual CPUs. This allowed the total number of very heavy Exchange users to increase from 2,000 to 12,000 while sendmail latency remained well within the range of acceptable user responsiveness. Processor utilization remained low, at about 15% of the total host processing capacity for 12,000 very heavy Exchange users.

Testing also shows that scaling out to eight Exchange Server VMs supports a workload of up to 16,000 very heavy users, with the load consuming only 32% of the ESXi host processing capacity.

Additional tests were undertaken to show the performance improvements of vMotion and Storage vMotion in vSphere 5. vMotion migration time for a 4-vCPU Exchange mailbox server VM showed a 34% reduction in vSphere 5 over vSphere 4.1. Storage vMotion migration time for a 350GB database VMDK showed an 11% reduction in vSphere 5 over vSphere 4.1.

image

For the full paper, see Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Performance on vSphere 5.

HP Sizer for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010

At the moment I am busy to design a Exchange 2010 environment.
The customer where I going to implement Exchange 2010 use only HP equipment.

A great tool is the HP sizer for Exchange 2010.

About the HP Sizer tool:
Microsoft® Exchange Server 2010 is a complex application that requires intensive knowledge of deployment strategies, interdependencies, server and storage performance related issues.HP has developed the HP Sizer for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 to assist customers with proper server and storage sizing for their Exchange Server 2010 deployments. The algorithms developed and implemented in this tool are based upon extensive testing of Exchange Server 2010 server roles and technologies, HP’s deep experience with Microsoft Exchange, and intricate knowledge of server CPU, memory, and I/O subsystems. This tool is free to download and use, and is designed to simplify configuration across a broad range of deployments. This newest Microsoft Exchange Server Sizer provides support for multiple site deployments, varied client types and access methods, all Exchange Server 2010 server roles, Database Availability Group (DAG) high availability options, choice of tower, rack mounted, or HP BladeSystem server platforms, and either direct attached or SAN-based storage solutions. Based on your input, the tool provides a comprehensive bill of materials along with a deployment overview of the Exchange Server 2010 server roles and storage configurations. Once this Sizer is installed, updates can be downloaded automatically to the underlying software engines that are necessary to provide support for HP server and storage product information details.

Please see the ‘What’s new” link on the home page of the Sizer (when installed on your system) for the most recent information.

Download: HP Sizer for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010

Rollup 5 for Exchange 2010 SP1

This update contains a number of customer-reported and internally found issues since the release of SP1. See ‘KB 2582113: Description of Update Rollup 5 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1′ for more details.

We want to let you know this rollup contains the Exchange 2010 SP1 version of the change described in this KB article:

2543879 PDF attachment from a Mac Mail client is not displayed when you use Outlook 2010 to open the email message in an Exchange Server 2007 SP3 environment

Most important fixes:

2556352 "ChangeKey is required for this operation" error message in Outlook for Mac 2011 in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2555850 You cannot delete a mailbox folder that starts with a special character in its name by using Outlook in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2499044 You cannot save attachments in an email message by using OWA if the subject line contains special characters in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

Other Fixes:

2275156 The inline contents disposition is removed when you send a "Content-Disposition: inline" email message by using EWS in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2509306 Journal reports are expired or lost when the Microsoft Exchange Transport service is restarted in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2514766 A RBAC role assignee can unexpectedly run the Add-ADPermission command on an Exchange Server 2010 server that is outside the role assignment scope

2529715 Slow network or replication issues after you change the number of virus scanning API threads in Microsoft Exchange Server 2010

2536704 Mailbox users who are migrated by using ILM 2007 cannot use the Options menu in OWA in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2537094 French translation errors occur when you edit a response to a meeting request by using OWA in an Exchange Server 2010 SP1 environment

2554604 A RBAC role assignee can unexpectedly manage certificates that are outside the role assignment scope in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2555800 You cannot use the GetItem operation in EWS to retrieve properties of an email message in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2556096 The columns in the .csv logging file are not lined up correctly when you perform a discovery search on a mailbox in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2556107 The columns in the .csv logging file are not lined up correctly when you perform a discovery search on a mailbox in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2556133 A device that uses Exchange ActiveSync cannot access mailboxes in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2556156 Extra.exe crashes when it performs RPC activity checks against an Exchange Server 2010 server

2556407 Certain client-only message rules do not take effect on email messages that are saved as drafts in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2559926 "There are no items to show in this view." error message when you try to view a folder by using Outlook in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

2572958  The "Test-OutlookConnectivity -Protocol HTTP" command fails with an HTTP 401 error in an Exchange Server 2010 environment

Download: Rollup 5 for Exchange 2010 SP1 Here

Important Note for Forefront users:

For those of you running Forefront Security for Exchange, be sure you perform these important steps from the command line in the Forefront directory before and after this rollup’s installation process. Without these steps, Exchange services for Information Store and Transport will not start after you apply this update. Before installing the update, disable ForeFront by using this command: fscutility /disable. After installing the update, re-enable ForeFront by running fscutility /enable.

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