Exchange Database Corruption after Installing SP2

Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 SP2 offers new features, more reliability and easier administration over its earlier counterparts. SP2 is a cumulative update that improves the Exchange messaging environment by including improvements in mobile messaging, mailbox and protection against spam. Before you upgrade your servers to Exchange Server SP2, it is recommended that you make complete backup of system state, file system and most importantly, Exchange databases. This assures of data availability in case the installation goes wrong in any way. But cases occur when your Exchange databases get corrupt when no clean backup is present. In such situations, you should use a powerful Exchange Server Repair product that can use safe scanning algorithms to repair a corrupted Exchange database.  

For instance, you can consider a scenario describes below:

1. You run Exchange Server 2003 SP1 or an earlier version
2. You decide to upgrade to Exchange Server 2003 SP2. During the installation of SP2, the setup failed to stop ExIFS (Exchange Installable File System) service but continues with no notice
3. After this, when you try to mount Information Store, it fails and events 470, 9519, 9518 and 104 are logged in the application log.

Cause 

The above symtoms suggest that Exchange database may have got corrupted due to installation of SP2. It can also occur if an antivirus software is scanning the Exchange databases. Solution Before making any database restoration attempts, you should make sure that Exchange databases are excluded from any antivirus scanning.

If databases appear as corrupted, you should consider these suggestions:

1.Try repairing the corrupted database by running eseutil /r command

2. If it fails, restore the database from the last backup you have

3. When no clean backup is available, you should use a Exchange Repair software.

Exchange Server Repair products are highly competent utilities with powerful scanning algorithms to repair a corrupted Exchange database. These software are infallible solutions to any issue of database inconsistencies. Equipped with graphically rich interface and options, such software provide guide you through easy to implement procedure of repairing the database.

Exchange Repair is an advanced and safe Exchange Repair utility that employs powerful scanning algorithms to repair a damaged Exchange Server database. It is compatible with Exchange Server 5.5, 2000 and 2003. It is a safe Exchange Server Repair utility with impressive set of features. The tool extracts user mailboxes in individual .pst file format files.

How to Solve Table Index Corruption in Exchange Server?

The main repository of mailbox data in Exchange Server is the .edb file that is primarily composed of b-trees. Since a b-tree is allowed to have a considerable depth, b-trees deploy indexes to permit quick data access. In Exchange EDB, there are few ancillary trees that hold table indexes to work with the main tree. If these indexes go corrupted, the entire table and sometimes, the whole database become unusable. This is what we refer as logical database corruption. In critical situations, when this type of corruption is not limited to index page corruption, you need to implement Exchange Server Repair solutions.

To understand such potential problems with Exchange database further, consider the discussed scenario and error. When using Exchange Server 2007, you can encounter event 467 logging in the application log. Additionally, on viewing the description section of the same event, you receive an error that reads similar to below:

Information Store (number) Index [index name] of table [table name] is corrupted.

This error typically indicates a corrupted index in the Exchange store. As symptoms, you might observe access violations and repeated crashes. Also, this type of corruption might go undetected for long without any symptoms. Even the Exchange-aware backup may fail to detect this corruption. Event 467 suggests logical corruption at Database (JET database engine) level and is exhibited when JET engine touches this location in the database while reporting it as event 447. For specific root causes, one needs to view the application and system log cautiously as these errors can damage your data badly.

Solution

Following suggestions can help you isolate the depicted problem:

1. If corruption is limited to index leaf pages and not with the database pages, running Eseutil /d (offline defragmentation) alone can perform Exchange Server Repair.

2. In critical problems, you may need to use ExMerge utility to move the mailboxes to a new, blank Information Store.

3. The Exchange Server might be affected from page or database level corruption together with index page corruption. In such cases, you can execute Eseutil /p and then Isinteg -fix commands as Eseutil /d command may not work. You can further use ExMerge tool to put the database again in use.

4. To avoid data loss problems due to Eseutil /p utility, it is however, recommended to opt for a safe third-party Exchange Repair utility.

The Exchange Repair is a professional utility that repairs corrupted Exchange EDB file and restores the mailboxes in separate *.pst files. The EDB Repair product is easy to use with its self-explanatory interface. Designed for Exchange Server 5.5, 2000, 2003, and 2007, the tool is also competent to recover deleted mailboxes.