Exchange Server 2013 RTM CU 1 Released!

Great news today, Microsoft has released Exchange Server 2013 RTM Cumulative Update 1 and you can find it here. But before you install the CU there is a number of things you need to be aware of. Here is a short list of some of the points to consider:

• This is a full build, that means that when installing a new server you do not need the RTM media. You can simply install using only the CU.
• Active Directory Preparation need to be done, this includes /PrepareSchema, /PrepareAD and /PrepareDomain.
• To upgrade from Exchange 2013 RTM run setup.exe /m:upgrade.

Read the full release notes here (will be made available 2013-04-03).

Multiple updates released including SP3 for Exchange 2010

Service Pack 3 for Exchange 2010

Microsoft has released a number of updates. The big news here is the release of Service Pack 3 for Exchange 2010 with the two following major features:

Coexistence with Exchange 2013
Support for Windows Server 2012

Great new for all of you wanting to implement Exchange 2013 in your existing environments. But coexistence also requires an update of Exchange 2013.  CU1 for Exchange 2013 is scheduled for release in Q1 so it should be released soon. That said, installing Exchange 2013 in a existing Exchange 2010 Service Pack 3 environment WILL work all tough it is not supported. But it enables you to start running tests in your lab and prepare for the release of CU1.

More information on SP3 for Exchange 2010 can be found here.
If you want to go straight to the download you can find it here.

More updates…

But wait, there is more… Microsoft has also released Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 SP2 and Update Rollup 10 for Exchange 2007 SP3. Both are considered security releases so they will be available on Windows Update.

More information on these can be found here.
Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2010 SP2 can be found here.
Update Rollup 10 for Exchange 2007 SP3 can be found here.

Multiple Update Rollups released

Microsoft has release a number of rollups for Exchange Server 2007 and 2010. If you want to go directly to the downloads use the following links:

• Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2010 Service Pack 1
• Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 3
• Update Rollup 5 for Exchange Server 2010 RTM
• Update Rollup 5 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 2

For more information have a look here:
http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2010/12/14/457194.aspx

Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2010

Exchange CXP team has released Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2010 RTM (KB 982639) to the download center.

More information can be found here: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2010/06/17/455191.aspx and here:http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=982639

Multiple Updates for Exchange Server

Microsoft has released a number of different updates for Exchange Server 2000, 2003, 2007 and 2010.

This is as part of a important Microsoft Security Bulletin that addresses issues in Exchange and the SMTP service that could allow denial of service.

Security Update for Exchange 2000 Server
This update needs to be requested. Description: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=976703

Security Update for Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2
This update needs to be requested. Description: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=976702

Update Rollup 10 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
Description: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=981407
Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=6a894b4e-12b6-4a91-9555-d813956b6aac&displaylang=en

Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 2 Description: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=981383
Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=b8f7f872-16d5-49d6-9867-adc01351c06f&displaylang=en

Update Rollup 3 for Exchange Server 2010
Description: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=981401
Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7dcf2390-dff7-4e3a-acca-03f4d43fb79a&displaylang=en

Happy Updating!

Update Rollup 3 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 2

As usual you can find more information on the subject on Microsoft Support: http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?kbid=979784

If you want to go straight to the download you can find it here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c781326a-7b81-444d-9836-760fa1e3a28a&displaylang=en

Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2010 RTM (KB 979611)

Microsoft has released Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2010 RTM and it is available for download here: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2010/03/05/454155.aspx

A complete list can be found here: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=979611 and here are some of the improvements:

KB 977633 This fixes IMAP4 clients ability to log on to their mailboxes if the mailboxes are located on Exchange 2003 backend servers and if the clients are connecting via Exchange 2010 CAS servers.

KB 979480 IMAPid was not working correctly after moving a lot of users from one Exchange 2010 server to another*. IMAP4 users complained about the inbox not being updated any more. Old messages were still visible, but messages which were received after the mailbox move were not visible. The problem affected different IMAP Clients. The problem did not affect MAPI clients and OWA. Now it is fixed up. *(Specifically this occurred in the situation with same DAG, now local storage instead of iSCSI storage, all servers are Exchange 2010 with Update Rollup 1 installed on Windows Server 2008 R2).

KB 979431 When user migrated from Exchange Server 2003 to Exchange Server 2010, and that user connected via POP3, the POP3 service crashed. This was fixed up so it will not crash.

KB 979563 Push Notifications didn’t work because Exchange Server 2010 was not sending SOAPAction header in the notify callback. This caused Exchange to receive a HTTP 500 response from the notification client and the webservice failed. Push notifications should now properly send that SOAP header.

KB 980261 We fixed passive page patching when diagnostic tracing code was needed for forensic analysis that was generating a -1022 error case.

KB 980262 Source side log copier errors are more gracefully handled when the log has a bad block and the read fails.

KB 979566 Activesync proxy was failing for linked mailboxes in a CAS to CAS proxy scenario where the users token is serialized and sent in the request. When attempting to create the client security context from the SID, a AuthZException was thrown because we did not have access to the token information of the linked account, so now for this it no longer throws exceptions.

Update 973917 causes "Service Unavailable" in OWA, ActiveSync and application pools to automaticly disabled in Exchange Server 2003 and repeated login prompts in Exchange Server 2007

or, “How to type a long topic…”

Long description (shorter solution presented below…)

Today an issue occurred on a customers Exchange Server 2003. The Outlook Web Access and ActiveSync had stopped working and when accessing OWA the error “Service Unavailable” where displayed. After a quick look in IIS Manager I noticed that the two application pools configured for Exchange Server 2003 had stopped.

I tried iisreset and the pools came back up. As soon as OWA or ActiveSync was accessed the pools stopped again.

The following Events where logged in the System Log:

Event Type:    Error
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1002
Description:
Application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ is being automatically disabled due to a series of failures in the process(es) serving that application pool.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Event Type:    Warning
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1009
Description:
A process serving application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ terminated unexpectedly. The process id was ’5892′. The process exit code was ’0xffffffff’.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Event Type:    Warning
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1009
Description:
A process serving application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ terminated unexpectedly. The process id was ’1276′. The process exit code was ’0xffffffff’.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Event Type:    Warning
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1009
Description:
A process serving application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ terminated unexpectedly. The process id was ’3884′. The process exit code was ’0xffffffff’.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Event Type:    Warning
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1009
Description:
A process serving application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ terminated unexpectedly. The process id was ’2212′. The process exit code was ’0xffffffff’.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Event Type:    Warning
Event Source:    W3SVC
Event Category:    None
Event ID:    1009
Description:
A process serving application pool ‘ExchangeApplicationPool’ terminated unexpectedly. The process id was ’3960′. The process exit code was ’0xffffffff’.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

I also noticed that these errors started to occurred directly after the installation of a couple of updates for Windows. After uninstalling one update at the time it finally worked, the update causing this issue where “Update for Windows Server 2003 (973917)”.

After uninstalling the update i got a Windows Authentication login prompt when accessing OWA. I looked at the Application Pools again and they where set to run by “Network Service”. I changes this to “Local System” an the problem was solved.

Short Solution

1. Uninstall Microsoft Update for Windows Server 2003 (973917)
2. Restart the server
3. Make sure that the correct user is set to run the application pools. Follow these steps:
   1.  In Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager, expand Application Pools.
   2.  Right-click ExchangeApplicationPool, and then click Properties.
   3.  Click the Identity tab, and then in the Select a security account for this application pool list, click Local System.
   4.  Click Apply, and then click OK.
4. Restart IIS
5. OWA and ActiveSync should now be working.

Let me know if you bump in to any other issues!

EDIT 2009-12-13
Microsoft has published a KB (KB973917) on this issue and recommends an reinstall of Windows Server 2003 SP2. See this page for more information: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=2009746. This is a larger operation then just uninstalling the update but with this solution you will also get the security changes included in the 973917 update.
Thanks Wes for providing the link!

Please do also note that Microsofts suggested solution of reinstalling SP2 for Windows Server 2003 enables Scalable Networking pack. You can find more information on this issue and a link to the hotfix that disables SNP on the Microsoft Exchange Team blog: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2008/03/12/448421.aspx

EDIT 2009-12-18
According to a good friend of mine over at Mailmaster this is also an issue on Exchange Server 2007. The symptoms here is repeated login prompts and SP1 Rollup 9 is the fix for you running Exchange Server 2007. More info at Magnus blogg: http://mailmaster.se/blog/?p=392.

EDIT 2009-12-22
Just thought I should add a link to where you can find more info on SP1 Rollup 9: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee221166(EXCHG.80).aspx 
And if you want you can download it from here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=55320be2-c65c-48bb-bab8-6335aa7d008c.