Windows SBS 2008 and Exchange Server

G

GCS

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 15, 2006
Messages
483
Just trying to get a basic understanding on how this all works since we are most likely headed this way in our office.

This is mainly in regards to email ...

Currently we have website and we use a 3rd party service to handle the email for our website.

If we set up a new server with SBS 2008 and Exchange we would no longer need the 3rd party email correct? (we DO NOT want to host our own website at this time)


Also how does the sharing of Outlook email, contacts, appointments etc work with all of this?

Mostly looking at how we can access our "outlook items" in the office when we are working at home on the VPN etc.

TIA

Greg
 
I have always thought third party email are always better..but that just me..
You would have to setup exchange server to connect to your domain so you can use it in public
example [email protected]
 
Well at the moment we have our website www.sasaccounting.com

emails are "user"@sasaccounting.com

Using Outlook 2007 on all systems running Windows XP.

Currently everyone has the mail downloaded to their system in outlook and replies from there and all is saved in outlook (of course).

We share the contacts and calendars via a 3rd part app (Office Calendar) since we do not have exchange installed. We cannot share emails this way (not sure we need or want to do that).

We would like to be able to work from home and see what we have sent/rcvd on the same account at the office.

To date we just set outlook up in both spots to leave messages on the server for a day etc. This does not of course help with the sent items which we often need since many of clients do not reply back to us with a copy of the email we sent them and we frequently need that to understand their response.

Would going to exchange resolve this issue?

I was also prompted by a client of ours to look at Google Apps as well which supposedly would do all of this but in a web based form so that you could log in from anywhere and see all of this info. Any thoughts on this?

Thanks

Greg
 
I'm not really a fan of google apps for businesses. And Gmail services have had several long outtages over the past year, not to mention the Chinese incident lol

Exchange can do everything you want it to do. However i would suggest bringing in someone to implement it as its not as easy as you may think
 
Already on that as install and configuration of SBS/Exchange is something I have never done.

Just making sure I have all my research done first before we pull the trigger since this is about a $4000 investment for us (hardware and labor for install/setup)

Thanks

Greg
 
The working from home part is completely separate from worrying about Exchange. You'll need to set up some kind of VPN system to allow remote connections. My company of 30 uses the one built-in to Windows Server, and it works just fine for us. I also have my remote clients setup to use Exchange over HTTP (option in Outlook) so my users don't need to be VPN'd in to get to the server.
 
Already running a VPN setup with our Cisco gear (UC520). When working from home and connected to the VPN each person "at home" is literally another extension in our system (phone as well). It works very seemlessly.

Mobile email/contact/calendar access would also be a plus for us. While we currently do not have this ability we are going OUT to more clients now than before and being able to access our stuff from say a blackberry or something would be nice to have.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top