Troubleshooting Exchange Server Protection Issues

Article
05/17/2011

Applies To: System Center Data Protection Manager 2007

The following table provides troubleshooting guidance on protection issues for computers running on Exchange Server.

Exchange Protection Issues

Issue	Possible Cause	Details
Exchange data is unavailable for protection.	Before you can protect Exchange Server 2007 data, you must install hotfix 940006. For more details, see Knowledge Base article 940006, "Description of Update Rollup 4 for Exchange 2007" (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=99291).	The following versions of Exchange Server must be installed on the computer that you want to protect: Exchange Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) - OR - Exchange Server 2007 Important To protect Exchange Server data, the Exchange Server databases must be mounted within each storage group.
DPM cannot protect Exchange Server data.	The eseutil.exe and ese.dll versions that are installed on the most recent edition of Exchange Server must be the same versions that are installed on the DPM server.	You must update eseutil.exe and ese.dll on the DPM server if they are updated on a computer running Exchange Server after applying an upgrade or an update. For more information about updating eseutil.exe and ese.dll, see Eseutil.exe and Ese.dll.
Recovery fails when trying to mount or dismount the Exchange Server database.	If you rename an Exchange Server storage group after protecting it, when DPM performs a recovery operation, the recovery will fail when trying to mount or dismount the database.	The caption of the Exchange Server storage group is used to mount and dismount the Exchange Server databases. If you rename the storage group, the caption stored in the protected object will be different from the actual caption and the mount and dismount operations will fail. If this occurs, we recommend that you do the following: Rename the storage group back to the original storage group name. When you detect a name change, update the caption name in the protected object. You can use the component name to identify a storage group to mount and dismount the databases under it instead of the caption name.
After you rename an Exchange Server storage group, the new name does not appear in the DPM New Protection Group Wizard.	If you use the original storage group name, data recovery fails when trying to dismount the database.	After you rename an Exchange Server storage group, you must restart the Microsoft Exchange Information Store Service before you create a new protection group. To start the Exchange Information Store Service Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. On the Services screen, scroll down and right-click Microsoft Exchange Information Store, and then click Restart.
DPM 2007 does not support incremental backups if circular logging is enabled for Exchange Server storage groups.	You cannot enable circular logging if you want incremental backups for Exchange Server storage groups.	For successful incremental backups, we recommend that you disable circular logging for the protected storage group. After you disable circular logging, restart the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service (msexchangeis). To disable circular logging Click Start, point to Programs, point to Microsoft Exchange, and then click System Manager. If the Administrative Groups branch exists in the left pane, expand it, expand the appropriate administrative group's branch, expand the Servers branch, and then expand the appropriate server's branch. If the Administrative Groups branch does not exist, expand the Servers branch in the left pane, and then expand the appropriate server's branch. To expand a branch, double-click the branch or click the plus sign (+) to the left of the branch. Right-click the storage group for which you want to disable circular logging, and then click Properties. Clear the Enable Circular Logging check box, and then click OK. Restart the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service (MSExchangeIS). To restart MSExchangeIS Click Start, click Run, and then type services.msc to start the Services snap-in. Right-click Microsoft Exchange Information Store, and then click Start. Note If you do not want to disable circular logging, you can modify the protection group properties so that synchronizations occur just before creating the recovery point. To change the synchronization frequency In the New Protection Group Wizard, on the Specify Short-Term Protection Policy page, select Just before a recovery point.
Replica initialization and express full backup operations stop prior to completion.	When you are protecting data on a computer running a version of Exchange Server, the DPM server must include the Ese.dll and eseutil.exe files that are located in the Exchange Server installation location.	To protect data on a computer running Exchange Server, perform the following steps. On the computer running Exchange Server, copy Ese.dll and eseutil.exe located in the Exchange Server installation location to the DPM server installation location. The default installation location on the DPM Server is <drive>:\Program Files\Microsoft DPM\DPM\Bin. Cancel the replica initialization and express full backup jobs that did not complete. Restart the canceled express full backup jobs. Run a synchronization with consistency check for canceled replica initialization jobs. Note We recommend that you use the same processor architecture for the DPM server and the computer running Exchange Server. If your processor architecture is different, you must do the following: Install the version of Exchange Server that you are protecting on a test server, which is consistent with the hardware of the DPM server. From the test server, copy Ese.dll and eseutil.exe located in the Exchange Server installation location to the DPM server installation location. The default installation location on the DPM Server is <drive:>\Program Files\Microsoft DPM\DPM\Bin.
The VSS writer does not clear Backup in progress state for the storage group.	In Exchange 2007 RTM and Exchange 2003 RTM, if you cancel the backup on a storage group within a particular interval (between PrepareForBackup and DoSnapshot), the VSS writer does not clear Backup in progress state for the storage group.	To recycle the VSS Writer for: Event ID 2024 A: Restart the Exchange Information Store service to recycle the writer. Event ID 2024 B: Restart the Exchange Server Replication service (Exssrv.exe) to recycle the VSS writer.
The Microsoft Exchange Information Store does not appear on the Select Group Members page of the New Protection Group Wizard.	If the Exchange Local Continuous Replication (LCR) VSS replica writer is enabled, the Microsoft Exchange Information Store will not appear on the Select Group Members page of the New Protection Group Wizard.	To display the Exchange LCR-enabled storage groups in the DPM New Protection Group Wizard, use the following set key command to disable the (LCR) VSS replica writer. set key EnableVssWriter under HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Exchange\Replay\Parameters to 0 DWORD type Note After setting the registry key, you must restart the Microsoft Exchange Replication Service.
All data replication jobs fail.	If the versions of Exchange Server Database Utilities (eseutil.exe) and ese.dll that are installed on the most recent edition of the protected Exchange Server are different from the versions that are installed on the DPM server, all data replication jobs will fail.	The eseutil.exe and ese.dll versions that are installed on the most recent edition of Exchange Server must be the same versions that are installed on the DPM server. For example, if you are protecting Exchange Server 2003 SP2, Exchange Server 2007, and Exchange Server 2007 SP1, you must copy eseutil.exe and ese.dll from the server running Exchange Server 2007 SP1 to the DPM server. The following scenarios show the versions of eseutil.exe and ese.dll that you must install on the DPM server: 32-bit operating system If DPM is protecting only computers running Exchange Server 2003 on a 32-bit operating system, copy eseutil.exe and ese.dll from the computer running Exchange Server 2003. If DPM is protecting computers running Exchange Server 2007, the 32-bit versions of eseutil.exe and ese.dll are required from Exchange Server 2007. You can obtain these versions from the Exchange Server 2007 Setup DVD. 64-bit operating system If DPM is protecting only computers running Exchange Server 2003 on a 32-bit operating system, copy eseutil.exe and ese.dll from the computer running Exchange Server 2003. If DPM is protecting Exchange Server 2007, copy eseutil.exe and ese.dll from the computer running Exchange Server 2007.
Exchange Server protection fails.	If the Exchange writer is turned off for the Volume Shadow Copy service in Windows Small Business Server 2003, protection will fail.	By default, the Setup program for Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 turns off the Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 writer for the Volume Shadow Copy service. To protect data using DPM 2007, the Exchange 2003 writer must be turned on. For more information about this issue, see Knowledge Base article 838183 "How to turn on the Exchange writer for the Volume Shadow Copy service in Windows Small Business Server 2003" (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=77040). To turn on the Exchange writer Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK. Locate and then double-click the following registry subkey: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\ParametersSystem Double-click the Disable Exchange Writer value. In the Value data text box, change the value from 1 to 0, and then click OK. Quit Registry Editor. Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. Stop and then restart the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service.
Online backup fails on computers hosting Exchange Server.	DPM does not support online backups on computers hosting Exchange Server.	To back up a computer hosting Exchange Server, we recommend that you perform a guest backup on the computer running Exchange.
Local continuous replication (LCR) protection fails with a VSS error.	If the Exchange Server replication service is not restarted after the registry key is set, LCR fails for the storage group.	Restart the replication service after updating the registry key.
Setting and unsetting the eseutil flag through the command line interface (CLI) fails.	The preferred server may not have been specified.	Provide the topology as PT_CCR_ACTIVE_ONLY along with the RunEseUtilConsistencyCheck option.
ID 30112: DPM encountered a retryable VSS error (0x800423F3).	The next incremental backup fails when an incremental backup is performed after you run ntbackup on the storage group.	Create a DPM full recovery point before performing an incremental backup.