Unified Communications Diagnostics 8.6.3

Table 2. Exchange server health test configuration.
Exchange server version	Required Configuration
All	Enable WMI on each Exchange server NOTE: WMI is required to support retrieving accurate disk space information when using mount points. If you do not use mount points, you can disable the requirement for WMI by clicking the Data Collection options link in the Server Health test wizard.

The test credentials must have the following permissions.

Table 3. Exchange server health test permissions.

Exchange server version

Permissions Required for Test Credentials

All

Member of Local Administrators group on each Exchange server. This is required for:

•

Read access to system drive to retrieve disk space

•

Read access to Windows system directory to access Event Logs

•

Read access to Service Control Manager

•

Read access to Registry to access Performance Counters and Event Logs

About the Exchange Delivery Health Tests

The Exchange delivery health tests allow you to monitor the ability of your servers to deliver email traffic. The Exchange delivery health tests include the following tests:

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Exchange Internal Server Delivery Health Test

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Exchange Internal Mailbox Delivery Health Test

•

Exchange External Message Delivery Health Test

•

Exchange Modern Message Delivery Health Test

You must meet the following software prerequisites to run the Exchange delivery health tests:

Table 4. Software required for the Exchange delivery health tests.

Exchange Version

Required Software

Exchange 2007/2010/2013

•

Install MAPI & CDO version 8.3.0.8353.000 or later). You can download MAPI & CDO here:

https://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id=42040

Exchange 2010 and later

•

PowerShell 2.0 or later

Exchange Internal Server Delivery Health Test

The Exchange Internal Server Delivery health test monitors the ability to deliver email within your organization. This test sends a test message from each target server in the test to every other target server.

Figure 1. A test message is sent from each server to every other server.

For example, if you select an Exchange organization as the test target and the organization has five mailbox servers, the test sends 20 test messages (5 source servers x 4 destination servers) at each monitoring interval.

You must manually create test mailboxes and match the name to the mailbox mask specified in the test configuration. For information about creating test mailboxes, see the Unified Communications Diagnostics User Guide.

When the test runs on Exchange 2007 and earlier servers, the test looks for a test mailbox on each server. The test mailbox can be on any store on that server. If there are multiple test mailboxes on each server, the test uses the first one it finds. By default, the test mailbox creation scripts create one test mailbox per store.

This health test is not supported for Exchange 2013 and later. This test is also not useful for Exchange 2010 organizations that have implemented Database Availability Groups (DAGs) since mailboxes in a DAG are not linked to a specific server.

For Exchange 2007, you can use the Internal Mailbox Delivery Health test to monitor the sending and receiving of messages between mailboxes. For Exchange 2010 and later, you can use the Exchange Modern Message Delivery Health test.

Recommendations for Performance Optimization

For large organizations, select a subset of the servers to reduce the amount of traffic generated. For example, select one server per geographical region. You can also decrease the monitoring frequency.

While the test is executing, storage groups and stores are enumerated in alphabetical order. If the test takes a long time to complete, you can create a test mailbox in the first storage group in the first store (in alphabetical order) on every server to speed up the query.

For example, you have a server called AMER-MBX-01 with the following stores:

•

First-Mailbox-Store (in storage group First-Storage-Group)

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Second-Mailbox-Store (in storage group First-Storage-Group)

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Third-Mailbox-Store (in storage group Second-Storage-Group)

If the mailbox mask specified in the test is the default mask (SOM_<ServerName>_<StorageGroupName>_<StoreName>, then the test looks for the following mailboxes for AMER-MBX-01 until it finds one that is accessible:

•

SOM_AMER-MBX-01_First-Storage-Group_First-Mailbox-Store

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SOM_AMER-MBX-01_First-Storage-Group_Second-Mailbox-Store

•

SOM_AMER-MBX-01_Second-Storage-Group_Third-Mailbox-Store

On Exchange 2010 servers, when the test runs, it looks for a test mailbox on each server. The test mailbox is in a mailbox database. If there are multiple test mailbox boxes on each server, the test uses the first one it finds. By default, the test mailbox creation scripts create one test mailbox per mailbox database.

For example, you have a server called AMER-MBX-01 containing Database1 and Database2. If the mailbox mask specified in the test is the default mask (SOM_<ServerName>_<DatabaseName>, then the test looks for the following mailboxes for AMER-MBX-01 until it finds one that is accessible:

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SOM_AMER-MBX-01_Database1

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SOM_AMER-MBX-01_Database2

<DatabaseName> token is optional.

All test messages sent are automatically deleted from the internal test mailboxes. But other mail, such as NDR messages, is not automatically deleted. You must manually clean out your test mailboxes periodically.

Test prerequisites

See the following tables for the test targets, required configuration, and the required permissions for this test. The Exchange Internal Server Delivery health test does not support Exchange 2013 or later.

You can run the test against the following target servers.

Table 5. Internal server delivery health test targets.
Exchange server version	Target type
Exchange 2007/2010	Mailbox role

The Exchange server must be configured as follows:

Table 6. Internal server delivery health test configuration.

Exchange server version

Configuration required

All

•

Create test mailboxes on each server that match the mailbox mask specified in the test configuration. For information about how to create test mailboxes, see the Unified Communications Diagnostics User Guide.

•

To track test messages, enable Tracking Logs on each Exchange server through which the test message passes.

The test credentials must have the following permissions.

Table 7. Internal server delivery health test permissions.

Exchange version

Permissions required for test credentials

Exchange 2007/2010

•

Full access permissions to each test mailbox to access the mailbox inbox to send and receive test messages

•

Member of Local Administrators group on each Exchange server through which the message passes

Exchange 2007

•

Must be a member of View-Only Exchange Administrators group

Exchange 2010

•

Must be a member of View-Only Organization Management group

Exchange Internal Mailbox Delivery Health Test

You can use the Exchange Internal Mailbox Delivery health test to monitor the sending and receipt of messages between mailboxes in an Exchange organization. This test supports DAG.

Test prerequisites

See the following tables for the test targets, required configuration, and the required permissions for this test.

You can run the test against the following target servers.

Table 8. Internal mailbox delivery health test targets.
Exchange Server version	Target type
Exchange 2007/2010/2013	Mailbox role


	TIP: For Exchange 2010 and later, it is recommended that you run the Exchange Modern Message Delivery Health Test instead, especially in scenarios in which the CAS server is behind a load balancer

The Exchange server must be configured as follows:

Table 9. Internal mailbox delivery health test configuration.
Exchange Server version	Configuration required
All	Create user mailboxes or dedicated test mailboxes for source and target mailbox pairs. For more information, see Historical Reporting Database Usage Estimates .