I'm looking to migrate from SBS 2003 to Server 2008 Std. Are there any guides out there similar to Microsoft's sbs to sbs guides? Thanks in advance!
3 Answers
You did not say if you were also migrating to Exchange on the same new server, or to a second seperate server, or at all. Either way, the swing migration is certainly the way to go.
If you do not intend to migrate Exchange, you should probably migrate your data to your new system, and then remove it first following this document: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb288905(EXCHG.80).aspx.
I do not believe that the errors the other guys references with regards to Exchange are a factor. When you add the new 2008 server as a domain controller, the current schema (the tables and fields in a database), including for Exchange 2003, is copied to that server, and you will even be making it the schema master. So all of the fields, including for Exchange, which are in the current schema will still be there on the new server even if Exchange is not in use, and that is nothing you can do anything about: You can not un-extend a schema. So whether you upgrade Exchange to the new 2008/2010, when you will further extend the schema; or if you remove Exchange 2003 totally, all that will happen is that you have empty fields in the database (Schema).
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I apologize for not giving the full picture. We are not using the exchange portion of SBS and we are going to a new physical server. Let me see if I understand you correctly. I should be able to go ahead with a swing migration and just ignore the parts of exchange that were moved over?– msindleMay 23, 2011 at 18:41
Migrating from SBS to a non-sbs platform is not as straight forward as an SBS to SBS migration due to the lack of Exchange.
If you perform a standard swing migration by joining the 2008 server to the domain, seizing the roles, and demoting the SBS you will have lots of exchange errors as those parts of the schema cannot copy over.
You could also use the ADMT 3.1 to transfer the roles, but again, dragging the SBS schema to the new server will cause issues unless you remove all of the exchange attributes beforehand.
You can tackle this in one of 3 ways:
.#1: Do the normal swing and clean up the mess after - running ntdsutil and doing a metadata cleanup on that server
.#2: Use the ADMT tool and Adsiedit to remove all the exchange attributes before migrating. This might work, but you will still probably have to perform cleanup as well.
.#3 Start from scratch, export AD user info with Csvde to anexcel file, build the new server, and reimport. At least that will get your users info.
Either way, good luck :-)
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I think option 2 sounds like it may be the easier way to go. How do I go about removing the exchange attribs?– msindleMay 20, 2011 at 18:11
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Here is the link to the Adsiedit page, you will find what you need here: technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc773354(WS.10).aspx– AmartelMay 20, 2011 at 20:59
I am just getting ready to go through the process, but two things that I found were helpful were these two links.
http://www.kdbsystems.ca/?p=60
They give step by step instructions for moving to server 2008 r2 WITH exchange 2010.
