Microsoft Exchange 2010 on Dell Systems

Simple Distributed Configurations

Solutions for 3,000 to 50,000 Mailboxes

Dell This document is for informational purposes only. Dell reserves the right to make changes without further notice to any products herein. The content provided is as is and without express or implied warranties of any kind. Dell, the DELL logo, and the DELL badge, PowerEdge, and PowerVault, are trademarks of Dell Inc. Microsoft is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products. Dell disclaims proprietary interest in the marks and names of others. Copyright 2010 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction or translation of any part of this work beyond that permitted by U.S. copyright laws without the written permission of Dell Inc. is unlawful and strictly forbidden. November 2010

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Table of Contents
1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 4 1.1 Overview .................................................................................................. 4 1.2 Finding Your Solution .................................................................................... 4 1.3 About the Simple Distributed Model................................................................... 4 1.4 Hardware .................................................................................................. 4 3,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510 ........................................................................ 5 2.1 Solution Requirements .................................................................................. 5 2.2 Recommended Solution ................................................................................. 5 2.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................... 6 5,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R710 with PowerVault MD1000 ......................................... 7 3.1 Solution Requirements .................................................................................. 7 3.2 Recommended Solution ................................................................................. 7 3.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................... 8 10,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510 ...................................................................... 9 4.1 Solution Requirements .................................................................................. 9 4.2 Recommended Solution ................................................................................. 9 4.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................. 10 10,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R715 with PowerVault MD1200...................................... 11 5.1 Solution Requirements ................................................................................ 11 5.2 Recommended Solution ............................................................................... 11 5.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................. 12 25,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510 .................................................................... 13 6.1 Solution Requirements ................................................................................ 13 6.2 Recommended Solution ............................................................................... 13 6.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................. 14 50,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510 .................................................................... 15 7.1 Solution Requirements ................................................................................ 15 7.2 Recommended Solution ............................................................................... 15 7.3 Architecture Diagram .................................................................................. 16

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1 Introduction
1.1 Overview
This Microsoft Exchange 2010 solution architecture manual contains possible configurations that can be used to architect your Exchange 2010 infrastructure. Samples in the manual are intended to serve as a blueprint or example for organizations whose requirements are similar. Each organizations requirements can differ significantly, though, and include items not accounted for in these configurations (e.g. message hygiene or third party archiving). For a configuration sized to your specific requirements, please contact your Dell representative or use the Dell Exchange 2010 Advisor tool at Dell.com/Exchange.

1.2 Finding Your Solution

Sample configurations for Microsoft Exchange on Dell server and storage hardware are provided in three manuals available from the Dell.com/Exchange landing page to help you find an appropriate solution for your needs. The three documents, which correspond to the three Dell Exchange 2010 architecture models, each contain multiple configurations of varying sizes, requirements and hardware choices. Small and Branch Office Model: Configurations ideal for small and branch offices with up to 1,000 mailboxes. Simple Distributed Model (this manual): Configurations that are streamlined, dedicated to Exchange, use internal server storage or direct-attached storage (DAS) and take the most advantage of the new high availability (HA) and replication features of Exchange 2010. Agile Consolidated Model: Configurations optimized for a shared, consolidated, and possible virtualized infrastructure.

1.3 About the Simple Distributed Model

These configurations have been designed for larger organizations (1000+ mailboxes) primarily interested in simplicity and ease of management. The model leverages the high-availability and disaster recovery features native to Exchange Server 2010 to help deliver robust, highly available Exchange environments in a simple, cost-effective manner. In particular, the simple distributed model utilizes all-in-one server and storage bricks that can be combined to cost-effectively deliver performance and high availability. A brick can be either a single storage-dense rack server such as the Dell PowerEdge R510 or a rack server such as the R710 combined with direct attached storage (DAS) such as the Dell PowerVault MD1200 enclosure.

1.4 Hardware
Sample solutions described in this manual use the following Dell equipment: PowerEdge R510 PowerEdge R710 PowerEdge R715 PowerVault MD1000 PowerVault MD1200

Click on the links to the product landing pages for additional information on each product.

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2 3,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510

2.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 3,000 .14 IOPS (~150 messages per day) 4GB 3 Backup and recovery infrastructure Site resiliency UM and Edge roles

2.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware Data volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details Detail 3x PowerEdge R510 servers with 14 drives each 2x quad-core processors and 48GB RAM 1 3 1,000 active and 2,000 passive Detail 3x PowerEdge R510 servers internal storage 14x drives each (2 for OS); 36 data drives total 12 1 250 3.5 NL-SAS 7.2K rpm 2TB RAID 0 (1 volume per drive) Databases and logs combined 1 database and log set per drive 25% estimate additional capacity for growth 128 KB element size or larger

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2.3 Architecture Diagram

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3 5,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R710 with PowerVault MD1000

3.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 5,000 .1 IOPS (~100 messages per day) 2GB 3 Backup and recovery infrastructure Site resiliency UM and Edge roles

3.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware Data volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details Detail 3x PowerEdge R710 servers 2x quad-core processors and 72GB RAM 1 3 1667 active and 3333 passive Detail 6x PowerVault MD1000 enclosures (2x per server) 15x drives each; 90 drives total 6 1 835 3 x 3.5" 7.2K rpm NL-SAS 1 TB per data volume and 1 x 3.5" 7.2K rpm NL-SAS 1 TB per log volume RAID 0 Databases and logs seperate 18% estimated capacity for growth NTFS allocation unit size = 64KB RAID stripe or element size = 256KB Up to 6x hot spares per server

Microsoft Exchange 2010 on Dell Systems: Simple Distributed Configurations

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3.3 Architecture Diagram

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4 10,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510

4.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 10,000 .1 IOPS (~100 messages per day) 2GB 5 (3 local and 2 remote) Backup and recovery solutions UM and Edge roles

4.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Detail 10x PowerEdge R510 servers with 14 HDDs (6 local and 4 remote) 2x quad-core processors and 48GB of RAM 1 10 Local servers: 1667 active and 3333 passive Remote servers: 5,000 passive Detail 10x PowerEdge R510 servers internal storage 14x drives per server (2 for OS); 120 data drives total 12 1 420 3.5 7.2K rpm NL-SAS 2TB RAID 0 (1 volume per physical disk) Database and logs combined 1 database and log set per drive 25% estimate additional storage for growth 128 KB element size or larger NTFS allocation unit size = 64KB

Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware Data volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details

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4.3 Architecture Diagram

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5 10,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R715 with PowerVault MD1200

5.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 10,000 0.15 IOPs per user (~150 messages/day) 3GB 3 Backup and recovery infrastructure UM and Edge Roles

5.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Detail 3x PowerEdge R715 servers 2x AMD OpteronTM 12-core processors per server 128 GB of DDR3 Memory 1 3 3360 Active + 6720 Passive Mailboxes Detail 9x PowerVault MD1200 enclosures (3 per server) 12x 3.5" NL-SAS 2 TB Disks per enclosure 108 drives total 36 1 280 Mailboxes 3.5" NL-SAS 2 TB RAID-0 Data and Logs combined on each volume Each HDD carries one active or passive copy in a RAID 0 with one database and log set per HDD 30% estimate additional storage space available RAID stripe or element size = 128 KB or larger NTFS Allocation unit size = 64KB for both DB and Log

Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware

Database volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details

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5.3 Architecture Diagram

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6 25,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510

6.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 25,000 .11 (~100 messages per day) for 18,000 users .14 IOPS (~160 messages per day) for 7,000 users 2GB 3 Backup and recovery infrastructure Site resiliency UM and Edge roles

6.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware Data volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details Detail 16x PowerEdge R510 servers w/ 14 HDDs each 2x quad-core processors and 64GB RAM 1 16 1563 active and 3124 passive Detail 16x PowerEdge R510 servers internal drives 14x drives each (2 for OS); 192 data drives total 12 1 382 3.5 7.2K rpm NL-SAS 2TB RAID 0 (1 volume per physical disk) Database and logs combined 1x database and log set per disk 15% estimated additional capacity for growth Stripe or element size = 128KB or larger NTFS allocation unit size = 64KB

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6.3 Architecture Diagram

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7 50,000 Mailboxes on PowerEdge R510

7.1 Solution Requirements
Number of mailboxes Average user I/O profile (messages/day) Average mailbox size limit Total active/passive copies per database Not included in this solution 50,000 .11 IOPS (~100 messages per day) for 35,000 users .14 IOPS (~160 messages per day) for 15,000 users 3GB 5 (3x local and 2x remote) Backup and recovery infrastructure UM and Edge roles

7.2 Recommended Solution

Server Configurations All-in-one (Mailbox/Hub/CAS) server Detail 55x PowerEdge R510 servers w/ 14 HDDs (33x local and 22x remote) 2x quad-core processors and 64GB 4 14 Local servers: 1516 active and 3032 passive Remote servers: 4546 passive Detail 55x PowerEdge R510 servers internal storage 14x drives per server (2 for OS); 660 data drives total 12 1 380 3.5 7.2K rpm NL-SAS 2TB RAID 0 (1 volume per physical disk) Database and logs combined 1x database and log set per disk 15% estimated additional capacity for growth RAID stripe or element size = 128KB NTFS allocation unit size = 64KB

Number of DAGs Servers per DAG Number of Active and Passive Mailboxes per Server Storage Configuration Storage hardware Data volumes per mailbox server Databases per volume Mailboxes per database Disk type RAID type Additional details

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7.3 Architecture Diagram

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