Public Folders - Delete Public Folders from 2003 after migrating to 2010 (via Adsiedit) - safe?

Question

Similar Question: How do I delete a public store in Exchange 2003?

We are ready to remove our Exchange 2003 server after having migrated all public folders and mailboxes to 2010. We ran for a week with the exchange 2003 server shut down and everything seemed to work.

When I try to delete the Public Folders database from 2003 it says it contains replicas. Whilst migrating I only had one was sync working (from 2003 to 2010) so I believe that 2003 hasn't received the responses from 2010 saying replica removed. When I look in Public folders on the 2003 box none are listed, when I look in Public Folders Instances they are all listed. I know everything has moved to the 2010 server and I know 2010 is not showing the 2003 server as a replica for any folders. I am looking to use ADSI edit to remove the Public folder database from the 2003 server, but want to ensure I am going to delete the right thing so that they do not get deleted from the 2010 database. I have checked and the only public folder with the old exchange server listed as a replica is SYSTEM CONFIGURATION.

Should I delete configuration, Services, Microsoft Exchange, Company Name, Administrative groups, First administrative group, Servers, Server name, Information store, First storage group, public folder store (Server name)? Or something else?

Answer 1

In Exchange 2003, databases are always child objects of Exchange servers; so you'l find them in the directory tree with a structure like

 <Administrative Group Name>
   <Servers>
     <Server Name>
       <Information Store>
         <Storage Group Name>
           <Database Name>

This changed in Exchange 2010, where databases are higher-level objects, and are no longer tied to a specific server.

So, yes, that's the right place where you will find an Exchange 2003 public folder database, and the right place where you can delete it.