Temporarily Increase Exchange 2000 / 2003 16gb Database Limit
This article covers the necessary stps to increase your Exchange 2000 / 2003 SP1 Database limit from 16GB to 17GB to allow you to perform database maintenence.
Temporarily Increase the Exchange 2000/2003 Mailbox Database Size Limit
Locate the following key in the registry: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\\Private-
Add a new REG_DWORD Value: ‘Temporary DB Size Limit Extension‘ set it to 1.This can only be used on servers running Exchange 2000 with the September 2003 Post-Service Pack 3 Roll up or Exchange Server 2003 SP1.Once the database is mounted remove unnecessary database content and then perform a defragmentation of the database in order to reclaim the database space.
In order to permanently resolve this issue on Exchange Server 2003 SP2:
First, verify that sufficient hard disk space is available for the larger database.
Always ensure you have 120% of the desired database size in free space for database maintenence.
For a mailbox store, click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\Server name\Private-Mailbox Store GUID
For a public folder store, click the following registry subkey:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\Server name\Public-Public Store GUID
Create a new DWORD Value; ‘Database Size Limit in Gb’ set the value as Decimal, and then an integer from 1 to 75.Note These integer values represent the maximum size of the database in gigabytes (GB). For example, a value of 75 represents a database that has a maximum size of 75 GB.
Restart the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service. To do this, follow these steps:
net stop msexchangeis
net start msexchangeis
In the Event Viewer tool, click Application event ID 1216 to verify that the database size has been set successfully.