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erictheavg
Asked: 2012-01-24 07:05:12 +0800 CST

Restoring mailbox from an old copy of priv1.edb and priv1.stm files

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Technical Info: Exchange Server 2003 in a mixed AD 2003/2008 environment on a Windows Server 2003 Standard 32-bit computer.

Background: We recently changed backup solutions. Of course, just before we did someone deleted all of his sent items and didn't report it to us for a couple of weeks. Now, the best solution we have for recovering those emails is a backup of the priv1.edb and priv1.stm files created a while back during a defrag of the Exchange server database.

What I tried: I installed Exchange on a secondary server, hoping that I could pop in those files and Exmerge the relevant pst file out of there. However, I didn't want to risk any conflicts with the live Exchange server, so I disconnected it from the network. But then I discovered it won't let me go into ESM without being on the network, so this wouldn't work.

Questions:

  • How does one export a mailbox out of the Exchange database (EDB) file, without attaching it to a server?
  • Am I going to have to attach the database file to the live Exchange server during off-hours, exmerge the pst files, and then swap the live database back?
  • Or, can I protect the live database by setting the main Information Store to offline while I work on the second instance of Exchange Server with the old database file?

Any advice is much appreciated!

exchange exchange-2003 edb

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    The approach I took previously, such restoring old data from Exchange 5.5 when we long ago moved to Exchange 2003 was this:

    1. Created a new domain on a disconnected environment, having the name of the original server/domain.
    2. Restored the Exchange to the new, disconnected environment and recovered all the data.

    That was long time ago, when the virtualization was not really "known", today that would ways easier. So build new virtual environment and restore all the data there.

    You need info such as this. Google for more.

    OR you can go ahead and get a tool which can open edb files. Those are also available. They might be expensive though.

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