Reduce the size of bulky Exchange server

Exchange administrators may not realize the unusual growth of their Exchange database size. This leads to mounting as well as inaccessibility issues. You can reduce the size of database as show below:

• Discard / Delete the unwanted mailboxes from the EDB file

  Deleting unused / ex-employees mailboxes data will create free white space for inserting new items. Ensure you will delete the unwanted data. After deletion of the data, you will not see any reduction in the size of the EDB file. Deletion creates white spaces in your disk. Exchange will use the free white space for adding new data. In this way you can avoid increasing the size of the EDB file.

• EDB file Defragmentation

  Defragmentation compresses the EDB file, eliminates the blank and unused white space, and reduces the EDB file size. Offline EDB file defragmentation will reclaim the free white space available. You can perform defragmentation using Eseutil, this process is very slow, where you perform this operation on an offline EDB file. Your Exchange mailboxes will be unavailable until this process.

  Run the below command in Exchange Management shell to know the whitespaces in EDB file:

  Command: Copy & Paste it on EMS

  Get-MailboxDatabase -Status | Format-List Name, DatabaseSize, AvailableNewMailboxSpace –Auto

  Note: For defragmentation of EDB file ensure you have free space is available on your disk, it should have more than the size of the EDB file.

  • Stop the Exchange Information Store service
  • Dismount the Exchange database for which the defragmentation is to be done

    Command: Copy & Paste it on EMS

    Dismount –Database

  • In the Exchange Management Shell, navigate to the location of the EDB file.
  • Perform defragmentation using the below command:

    Command: Copy & Paste it on EMS

    Eseutil /d ""/t"<a temporary location\TempDatabaseName.edb>"

  • Mount the database again

    Command: Copy & Paste it on EMS

    Mount –Database

  • After the completion of the defragmentation process, start the Information Store service.
  • Check if the database has been mounted, and then verify send and receive emails are working.
  • Check the white space to verify the success of the defragmentation.
• Move all mailboxes to a new database

  Alternate to performing defragmentation, many Exchange administrators create a new database and then move the required mailboxes from the older one to the new one. Older one can be deleted thereafter. The advantage is that the mailbox down time is negligible

  Alternatively, you can backup EDB files data to PST files using EdbMails. You can directly migrate the mailboxes to your new Live Exchange server database without any downtime. You can export the unused, ex-employee’s mailboxes to PST and save it as backup. EdbMails Exchange server recovery tool will make the entire process easy and effortless.

To reduce Exchange EDB file size, you have options, delete unwanted mailboxes data, perform defragmentation, move mailboxes data to a new database, etc. convert EDB to PST file using EdbMails Exchange Server recovery tool.