Importing a PST file into Exchange 2010 requires the use of the Exchange Management Shell (EMS) and lots of Powershell scripts and cmdlets. here I go through how to get started. You can watch a video on this too!
A PowerShell cmdlet in the EMS is used to perform the action. Use of this cmdlet requires that the current user has Import Export mailbox roles on their profile. Exchange 2010 RTM also requires that Outlook 2010 x64 is installed on the machine. This is no longer a requirement of Exchange 2010 SP1.
So, to import a single PST file into an Exchange 2010 mailbox:
- Install Outlook 2010 64-bit on the Exchange Server. By default, on a machine with no pre-existing Office installation, the 32-bit applications will install from the DVD’s autorun setup. Be sure to manually run the install from the x64 directory to install 64-bit Outlook. This step is not necessary for Exchange 2010 SP1, as this includes a MAPI provider.
- Enable import permissions for a security group your user belongs to (in this case ‘Mailbox Support’) with the command:
New-ManagementRoleAssignment -Name "Import Export Mailbox Admins" `
-SecurityGroup "Mailbox Support" `
-Role "Mailbox Import Export"
- Import the PST file into the appropriate user’s mailbox with the following command:
Import-Mailbox -PSTFolderPath pstfilepath -Identity exchangealias
Exchange 2010 SP1 differs a little in that you don’t need to install Outlook 2010 x64, and rather than the synchronous ‘Import-Mailbox’ cmdlet, the asynchronous ‘New MailBoxImportRequest’ can be used.
This takes the form of:
New-MailboxImportRequest -FilePath pstfilepath -Mailbox mailbox
One of the advantages of this new cmdlet (other than being asynchronous), is that you can specify an additional –IsArchive parameter, which will import the PST into the user’s archive mailbox.
I did experience a few problems using these cmdlets during my research for this guide. The Exchange 2010 RTM Import-Mailbox on one system refused to play nicely, throwing the following error:
Error:
Error was found for XXX because: Error occurred in the step: Approving object. An unknown error
has occurred., error code: -2147221219
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidOperation: (0:Int32) [Import-Mailbox], RecipientTaskException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : CFFD629B,Microsoft.Exchange.Management.RecipientTasks.ImportMailbox
Not a lot of help in itself – a little Googling and experimentation revealed four main causes for this error:
- The appropriate role permissions had not been added to the user’s security profile.
- The version of MAPI being used had somehow got confused. Running the ‘fixmapi’ command from the command prompt should fix this.
- The PST file is password protected.
- There is a bug in Exchange.
In my case I’d unfortunately hit the fourth case and the work around proved to be pretty horrific It may simply be worth waiting for a fix from Microsoft. To complete my task, I had to temporarily add a new domain controller to my network to host a new Exchange 2010 server. I then moved the mailboxes for which I had PSTs to import to this new server, performed the import, then moved the mailboxes back to their original Exchange Server, and removed the temporary server from the network. Upgrading the system to 2010 SP1 and using the ‘New-MailBoxImportRequest’ cmdlet on the same system yielded the following error:
Couldn't connect to the target mailbox.
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (0:Int32) [New-MailboxImportRequest], RemoteTransientException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : 1B0DDEBA,Microsoft.Exchange.Management.RecipientTasks.NewMailboxImportRequest
Again, this appears to be a known issue, and apparently due to be fixed before the release of SP1.
In my next post I will go through finding PST files on your network the manual way.
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