Before I could start with the installation of exchange 2007 sp1 I would like to recall the process of upgrading your exchange 2003 with the service pack. In exchange 2003 or prior version whenever we need to upgrade the exchange application with latest service pack simply we will insert the cd and click on update.exe. This process will completely take care of upgradation. In exchange 2007 the same thing applicable but there is a difference between the prior and this version of exchange 2007. In prior version we should have exchange application installed and then we need to upgrade it to with latest service pack but in exchange 2007 this is not the case even if you don’t have exchange 2007 application installed, you can simply run service pack 1 exe file which will install the exchange application. So if you have just exchange 2007 service pack 1 no worries you can go ahead and install exchange 2007 because this sp1 contain the entire installation exe files which we had in exchange 2007 dvd.

Brief summary what are the prerequisite for installing Exchange 2007:
Active Directory preparation.
Server specific preparation
IIS, MMC 3.0, .net framework 2.0 & Powershell.

 If we meet the above requirement we are ready to install exchange 2007. But for installing exchange 2007 sp1 you require to meet some requirement.
First thing we should meet the above requirement as I mentioned earlier for Exchange 2007.

1) Then we need to install Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 (SP1). If you cannot install .NET Framework 2.0 SP1, install hotfix Microsoft Knowledge Base article 942027.
For download: .Net Framework 2.0 SP1

2) Need to install hotfix for time zone update for Microsoft Windows operating systems

If you meet the above requirement then you can go ahead with the installation of Exchange 2007 service pack.

In this article I am going to describe you about how to go with fresh installation of exchange 2007 (native mode). But before I could start with pure installation of exchange 2007 sp1. I would like to share my view regarding the scenario where we have exchange 2007 already running in our production environment.

There are two possibilities where we could come up with the situation if we have already exchange 2007 in our production how will the upgradation process for service pack1 or with a fresh installation.

                                        Upgrading your existing Exchange 2007 with service pack1

  As I told you earlier, if we are planning to upgrade exchange 2007 with  service pack we need to have a additional installation of hotfix i.e. .NET Framework 2.0 SP1 & hotfix for time zone. If you won’t meet this two requirement your upgradation will be failed.

  I assume that we have met all the above criteria for Exchange 2007 upgradation. When you install exchange 2007 service pack it will go through clean installation process method. Actually background it will follow the following steps:

Organization Preparation 
              It will performs all the necessary task to prepare your Active Directory for exchange 2007.

Preparing Setup
            It will stop all Exchange services and performs other tasks that are required before uninstalling the previous version of Exchange.

Remove Exchange Files 
            Here it will uninstall the exchange files.

Preparing Files 
            Prepares files for installation.

Copy Exchange Files 
            Copies the Exchange files to the current installation directory.

Server Roles 
            Upgrades each of the server roles that were previously installed.

Management Tools 
            Upgrades the Exchange management tools.

Finalizing Setup 
            Finalizes the upgrade, including starting Exchange services.

So based on the above process you can see that Exchange 2007 service pack 1 is almost like we are doing a new installation which has upgraded one version. It will check the prerequisite for organization, then it will stop all the services & uninstall the existing exchange 2007 and will reinstall with the new version file.

Installing Exchange 2007 service pack1 as a new installation:

 I have Active Directory called as Happy.com which is DC\GC & DNS.
 Now I am going to do fresh installation of Exchange 2007 service pack1.
 Servername : E2K7.happy.com
 I have prepared my active directory and server specific requirement.
 AD preparation of my server:
 OS version : Windows 2003 with sp2
 Raised domain & forest function level to native mode (Note : I have raised my forest functional level to native mode because I want a trust relation for galsync)

 Note: Inorder to raise the forest function level to native mode first you need to raise the domain functional level.
 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322692

 Server specific requirement:  Installed IIS, .net framework, powershell, .netframework with sp1 & hotfix for time zone.

After you met the above requirement you can go ahead with unattended installation or normal GUI installation.

I am running the installation with GUI interface:

The first screen appear in the process of setup is installation page where you can the list of prerequisite and exchange 2007 sp1 installation.
Tips : the first three requirements i.e above exchange 2007 sp1 installation, everything is greyed out that means we have met those requirements.
Figure1:



Simply click on step4: Install Microsoft Exchange server 2007 sp1.

Figure2:

Figure2 gives you the same introduction page as like we had in exchange 2007 setup version but it is giving out the added feature which is included with this pack.

Figure 3: EULA (End Users License and Agreement)


Figure4: The next screen appear after EULA is error reporting page, where you can send mail to Microsoft if any issue come in that server, in my lab I had selected “No” but in realtime it is always recommended to select “Yes”


Figure 5: Installation page where you can select which are the roles needs to be installed
I have selected the typical one.


Figure6: Create a Exchange organization. If you have already run setup.com/preparead /organizationname:Happy. Then this page won’t appear


Figure7: Option to choose legacy support for your outlook client. If you choose yes then in the Exchange 2007 organization it will create a public folder database otherwise if you require to have public folder later you need to create it manually.


Figure8 & Figure 8.1: This page will display the readiness check like which are components require – IIS and current version of OS is supported or not.
Figure 8:


Figure 8.1


Figure9 : In this screen you will see the actual installation process like extending schema, copying the file and installing server specific roles


Figure10: It will display the status of completion of the exchange 2007 server with service pack1


Figure11: After the successful installation it will prompt you to take a reboot of the server



After reboot if you open the Exchange Management Console => Server : you can see the new version of Exchange application : version 8.1 (Exchange server with service pack1).

From the powershell you can type : get-exchangeserver. (to know the  exchange version)

After going through this article you will feel that service pack installation of exchange 2007 is totally different from previous version service pack update, because it will completely do a fresh installation of Exchange Application.

Note: You might be thinking why I should put this chapter as part of the single-cross forest transition, because before I could start with IIFP (Galsync) and move mailbox, it is very important to understand that Galsync is supported on Exchange 2007 service pack 1 application so you should understand the background process of installing service pack 1 so that you can avoid any issue which might come on the way during the installation of exchange server 2007 service pack1. (Precaution is better then cure  )

I hope this article is being very much informative for you all. Thanks a lot for sharing your time.

Related Article:
Transition from Single Forest to Cross-Forest : Brief Introduction how to go with transition process : Part-1

Upcoming Articles:
Transition from Single Forest to Cross-Forest : Configuring Identity Integration Feature Pack : Part-3

Transition from Single Forest to Cross-Forest : User account and mailbox movement from one forest to another forest : Part-4

Reference Link:
Upgrading to Exchange 2007

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 Setup Wizard > Progress Page