New Mailboxes Aren't Being Backed Up

[RichardTakacs]

Bit of a weird one.

We are running BE2012 SP2 on Server 2008 R2 standard SP1.

Exchange is 2010 and running on Server 2008 R2 SP1.

We copy a working User's AD profile (the copied profile's mailbox backs up aswell) and then create a new mailbox for the user in Exchange 2010's Management Console.

Our backup job has a tick for the Mailbox Database (so i'd assume it would backup the entire database including the new mailboxes).

When checking our backups the next day the new mailboxes are not present.

I have created a new backup job to backup just the Mailbox Database but this also does not see the new mailboxes.

I have tried Googling this issue but cannot find anything helpful and the backups do not report that they have failed, so not much to go on there.

Any help would be much appreciated.

[Colin_Weaver]

a) If instead of copying a mailbox you create a new one does it work?

b) make sure that someone has logged into the mailbox and at least one e-mail has either been sent or received before the backup

Depending on results of above consider logging a formal support case as this sounds like something we may need to investigate more thoroughly

[Jaydeep_S]

To add to what Colin has mentioned. Backup Exec does backup the entire mailbox database so the new mailboxes are surely backed up.The question is when are these profile copy and new mailbox creation done. Do they reflect in the next days Backup if not on the same day.

[RichardTakacs]

Colin;

a) Sorry for the confusion. I copy a user's AD profile and then i go into the Exchange management console and create a new mailbox for an existing user.

b) We use an application called Goldmine for emails (for the majority of our users (IT not included), so will have to check that out.

Jaydeep;

I created the mailboxes a week ago and they do not appear in the latest backup sets' contents.

[Jaydeep_S]

I would say, try out what Colin mentioned about creating a new AD user instead of copying and create a mailbox for that user.

Also, try reselecting the Information Store in the backup selection. If nothing works, it is better if you open a support case and work with a technician.

[RichardTakacs]

Thanks for your help, it is much appreciated.

What i've done so far;

I created a new user through the Exchange Management Console & gave it a mailbox instead of creating the user in Active directory users and computers.

Ran a full backup and the mailboxes weren't there..

Logged in and sent an email using the new user, ran a backup and the new mailbox appears.

So... i granted myself permissions to their mailboxes and opened their mailbox in OWA and sent an email to myself, tried another backup and the other users were still not there (although the new user is).

So it looks like any user that hasn't been created in the Exch management console don't get picked up?

Bizarre.

[Jaydeep_S]

It should not be so. Could you try to create a user in AD, then create a mailbox and activate it, by sending / receiving an email to / from it and see if that shows up in the backups.

[RichardTakacs]

Will try this on Monday chaps.

Have a good one and i'll post what i find as and when it happens.

[lmosla]

Also check and make sure the mailbox is not hidden in the GAL

[RichardTakacs]

I created a new user in AD Users and Computers (test.user)

Created a new mailbox for an existing user (test.user) in Exchange Management Console, checked it wasn't hidden from GAL.

Logged in and sent an email using this user.

Ran our full backup and the user is not there.

Checked the permissions and they are the same as a user i created on Friday through EMC (joe.bloggs) which backed up ok.

[Jaydeep_S]

It should not happen this way. It would be better if you open a support case and troublehsoot with Tech support.

[Jaydeep_S]

I had monitored your case progress with the Advanced Engineer and seems like you have reached a solution. Please let us know if we can be of any assistance in the future.

[RichardTakacs]

For everyone wanting to know, it was me a complete and utter ding-bat.

When creating the new mailboxes i left the mailbox's database to be decided by the exchange server rather than selecting it manually.... even though it went in the correct database for some users but not all.

So, my bad...i'll slap my wrists later when i have a moment but i did learn something. Exchange 2010 will try and balance out your mailboxes into different databases when unless specified during the mailbox setup but you should be able to stop mailboxes from going into certain databases (unless specified) by running the follow powershell command;

Set-MailboxDatabase -Identity "Mailbox Database" -IsExcludedFromProvisioning $true

And you can re-enable it by running;

Set-MailboxDatabase -Identity "Mailbox Database" -IsExcludedFromProvisioning $false