Can I run my PDC as NT 4.0 Server and run Exchange 2003 on Windows Server 2003?

We need to upgrade our email system to Exchange 2003 from
Exchange 5.5 SP 4 because we have more users that need to
use OWA and the 5.5 version isn't that great and also we
have users that need to access the server as a pop server.

I am led to believe exchange 2003 is good at being used
as a pop server, whereas on 5.5 it isn't great.

But to run Exchange 2003 we need to upgrade the server to
either windows 2000 or windows 2003 server. My choice is
obviously 2003 as it is newer.

At present our mail server is a BDC.

Our PDC and our database server all run nt 4.0 server.

If I upgrade our mail server to win 2003 server will this
cause problems with the PDC being NT 4.0 server.

Will I need to upgrade all the servers to Windows 2003?

Thanks very much

 

Hi Paul,

to run Exchange 2000 or later, you will _have to_ upgrade your whole domain
from NT 4 to at least active directory 2000... If you don't, you won't be
able to install and run Exchange 2000 (or Exchange 2003)...

Mike

 

Exactly. You need to first upgrade your PDC to Windows 2k3 which will convert your domain to Active Directory. Then I'd upgrade any BDCs (although I've never upgraded the OS on an Exchange box before), set the domain to native mode and run the forestprep and domainprep to prepare it for Exchange 2k3. Once that is all done you can follow the upgrade or migration path for Exchange 2k3.

Phil