Exchange 5.5 -- edb.log files are filling my hard drive!!

[icartmanxx]

I am running Exchange 5.5 and my hard drive is filling up with all of the log files. The server is in the process of completing a full backup and hasn't finished yet but I have over 1GB of EDB.LOG files at this point in time and am running out of disk space. The weird thing is that about a month ago our backups weren't working properly and we enabled circular logging to prevent this from happening. When I check the server properties circular logging is still enabled on the Information Store but I have over 200 edb.log files!! I also noticed that the earliest log file is from 6:00 PM last night right through til now. The Priv.edb file is dated Monday (I would think it would have today's date if it is being updated) and the Pub.edb is dated today and changes every 10 minutes or so.

I am confused regarding the following:
-why has the Priv.edb file not changed since Monday.
-why do I have over 200 log files when circular logging is enabled.
-how do I get this working and avoid running out of disk space

Please help...

 

[zbnet]

You might have a mail loop - these can generate enough email to produce this many log files when circular logging is enabled - try stopping your IMS service temporarily and see if the transaction log file situation stabalised.

I guess you realise that enabling circular logging is very dangerous from a DR point of view? You've essentially killed any chance of rolling back to a previous backup if you have any difficulties with your priv.edb.

Be careful checking the file properties of the db files - because the db is locked for writing, the OS doesn't always have a handle on the latest file characteristics. The OS catches up with its view of the properties of the db files when you stop the IS service.

Once you sort out any mail loop, the most important thing to do is get your backups sorted out, turn off circular logging, and take a full online backup of your store.

 

[Zelandakh]

-why has the Priv.edb file not changed since Monday.
Don't worry about that. Its being updated, not changed. That's a Windows date, not Exchange.
-why do I have over 200 log files when circular logging is enabled.
Circular logging rewrites into log files that currently exist.
-how do I get this working and avoid running out of disk space.
You shouldn't make any more logs unless you've not restarted the Exchange services since you enabled CL.

At the end of the backup, please report progress. Can you add more drives to the server?

 

[fuego007]

First, circular logging will not prevent you from using your last backup. Having circular logging enabled simply prevents you from being able to recover data to the time of a crash - any mail that was received between the last backup and the crash will be lost.

Second, look at the date-time stamps on your log files. You should have an edb.log and four named edbxxxxx.log that are fairly current. All the others should predate the time when you changed back to circular logging. Also, set your explorer view to detail and check for log files with the archive bit set. All of these files can be deleted, as their info has been committed to the database. If you have more than 5 log files after this, stop and restart your information store. and check again after a little while.

A mail loop will NOT cause the generation of more than 5 loge files when circular logging is enabled. this would only slow the server.

Once you have a good backup and have found out why you have more log files than you should with circular logging, I recommend you disable circular logging and make sure you perform daily backups. The backup software (NT Backup or any exchange-aware backup app) will automatically delete committed log files once they have been backed up.