E2K7 Server Roles/Exchange 2007 - Server Roles

By now many of us know about these roles but writing about these roles is an tap for few of us who were still busy with Exchange 2003 to get up and notice these server roles.

Exchange 2007 with its five roles and greater  64-bit power will benefit those who have a clear plan of what they want to achieve with their email servers.

Five Exchange 2007 - Server Roles

1. Mailbox Server Role
2. Client Access
3. Bridgehead
4. Unified Messaging
5. Gateway (Edge) ( Not a part of your Exchange /AD domain

• MAILBOX SERVER

Mailbox is a good and obvious name for your main server. Mailbox Server linked to Client Access Server would be like the Back-end and Front-end setup as in Exchange 2003 servers.

• CLIENT ACCESS SERVER ( CAS )

This server specializes in directing non-mapi clients to their mailboxes on MailBox server. For OWA clients you must install this role on at least one server.

Large implementations are likely to replace Exchange 2003 front-ends with Exchange 2007 servers which just have the Client Access server role installed.  For client access you need ASP.Net and the World Wide Web (WWW) service is needed for CAS.Provides mobility connectivity as well as Web services

• BRIDGEHEAD/HUB SERVER

The bridgehead role replaces the old routing connectors.  Smaller organizations would probably add this role to the Mailbox Server or possibly the Client Access server.

• EDGE SERVER/ OR GATEWAY

The Gateway server must be in it's own workgroup and, be a member of the Exchange Organization's Active Directory domain. Acting as an SMTP gateway,

Some of us call it a filter server. Spam filter ?

• UNIFIED MESSAGING

This server hosts the integration of voice (voice-mail), calendar, email and fax.  Unified messaging enables voicemail and faxes to be delivered to the Outlook 2007 inbox.
Integrates with the Private Branch Exchange (PBX) systems 


Figure 1 Server Roles