Suggestion needed

[Brysk]

I have setup Exchange Server 2k3, with 2 Storage Group, one for the direction users and the other one for the rest of the compagny but my boss want to have four Storage Groups:
Directions
Chefs
Staffs
Employees

Is it a good idea, will I loose performance, what is the impact to have four mdb files instead of two ?

Thank you

 

[AndyPeck]

Assuming you place each storage group on it's own set of spindles you'll gain in performance.

 

[PScottC]

I would create 4 MB stores in one Storage Group. As suggested by Andy, move each MB store to it's own set of spindles, and move the Logs to a separate set of spindles.

PSC

Governments and corporations need people like you and me. We are samurai. The keyboard cowboys. And all those other people out there who have no idea what's going on are the cattle. Mooo! --Mr. The Plague, from the movie "Hackers

 

[nickpark]

...and probably keep a store for Public Folders.

Each Storage Group has a set of transaction logs. These files are written to sequentially (appended to all the time.) Therefore, if they share spindles with other files, performance is degraded significantly.

Each Mail Store has 2 database files (.stm and .mdb) These are written to using random access. Splitting one into four (or five if no PF) will not degrade performance.

You do however get advantages: Backing up and restoring these smaller database files is easier and each store can have a different policy. (You really need the same disk space free as the biggest Mail Store database to recover it from backup.)

So, go with AndyPeck if you have lots and lots of drives. Go with PScottC if you have more modest storage.

 

[Zelandakh]

Storage groups take more RAM. Keep to one storage group.

Keep to one store unless you go over 30GB. If you break them up you are losing single instance storage across the org and slowing things down.

If you put all Directors in one storage group, have a guess which one will fail. Think of airplanes - split the company sensibly.

 

[Brysk]

As PScottC suggest,
I have create another Mailbox Store, but when I move users to the newest Mailbox Store. Users are not able to send or receive email. I have restart all services and stil not able to send or receive email.
Sent email still in the Outbox.