Best resources for learning Exchange?

[iamkion132]

I've been doing alright when it comes to using Exchange 2003 given that before I have had zero experience with it. However, it's just really basic stuff and nothing that advanced. I don't really need to learn a ton more than what I have managed to pick but I would feel more comfortable knowing why something works and what to do if I screw something up. Are then any good (free?) resources out there that might help me learn the basics of Exchange 2003 and I guess 2008 now that it's out even though I don't use it? It doesn't matter how advanced it gets because I have some days at work that I have nothing else to do except read and learn.

 

[Asgorath]

Go buy some books. Also, go browse around exchange user forums.

The books are nice because they expose you to situations you might not otherwise find yourself in.

Then go setup an ESXi box with a dummy domain and start playing around. Try edge servers, redundancy, backup types, recovery types, recovering from the logs, etc etc.

Snapshot the boxes then purposefully simulate a hard drive crash or data loss. Then try your recovery types. Lots of situations you can learn on.

 

[StarTrek4U]

Virtualizing an exchange environment is a great way to start. Also check out MS TechNet as there are a ton of good articles.

On a different note- it's exchange 2003 and 2007, exchange 2007 runs on windows server 2008 or server 2003.

Keep in mind that exchange 2007 is also 64-bit only unless running some sort of demo/eval/beta version and therefor requires a 64-bit host OS- keep that in mind when setting up your VM environment.