The new Microsoft Exchange Server 2016 Building Block Architecture. The Exchange Server 2016 mailbox servers on the Internal network are the points of communication for all clients, Active Directory and all other services that communicate with Exchange server. Internet client communication is also routed to the Exchange mailbox server. It is not recommended you expose the Exchange Client Access server directly on the Internet. Traffic should be routed via a LoadMaster appliance acting as a reverse proxy. The Edge Transport server should also be positioned in the perimeter network where it can help protect the internal mailbox servers. DNS MX records should be configured to use the Edge Transport server, or to any hosted solution like Microsoft Online protection which can then forward mail to the Edge Transport server.

What is Exchange Server?

Exchange server, being a product of Microsoft, is a mail server and calendar server, that helps small and medium scale companies to achieve better reliability and improved performance.It runs only on Windows Server Operating systems. It can also be called as a server-side application which provides data to the client-side collaborative application platform. This messaging platform or exchange mail server provides flexibility for sending emails, calendaring, voicemail transcriptions, scheduling, and tools to customize collaboration and messaging service applications.There are various other email protocols apart from an exchange server, like POP3, IMAP, MAPI, and Exchange ActiveSync.

Benefits of Exchange Server

Microsoft Exchange server plays a vital role in your day to day life. Be it official documents, security or mobility, Exchange server’s capabilities could not be paralleled so far.

The top 10 benefits of an exchange server are:

• Official appointments: The mail exchange server won’t let you miss an appointment again. It will inform your customers in case you are out of office, as they get an auto-generated reply right away.

• Confidentiality of emails: When you are out of your office, it gives you the flexibility of allowing your trustworthy colleagues to check that nothing important gets unnoticed. Thus, it keeps the business moving forward by enabling others to check your availability for a crucial meeting and book appointments.

• Address book feature: Now, you need not worry about the email address of different employees. All the addresses will be automatically updated in the address book and will come in handy during an urgent requirement like bulk messaging or other urgent confidential messaging ensuring security.

• Enhanced team productivity: It helps in maintaining proper communication between employees by providing them access from home, office, away from the office or abroad. Thus, it simplifies the means of communication very effectively and helps in rapid growth and productivity.

• Cost effective: In comparison to other email protocols, Exchange mail server reduces the cost of communication because it is quick and consumes less budget as compared to a phone call, fax, and type and send hard copies of letters.

• Customer satisfaction: Microsoft exchange server enables companies to be extremely responsive to customers’ queries and resolve issues at the earliest possible leading to the greater satisfaction of customers in no time.

• Security: It offers better security options than fax and emails. The companies need not worry about leakage of confidential data as it has features like leakage protection, archiving and retention of sensitive information, without compromising on the maintenance of compliance with the government’s and industry’s regulations.

• Mobility and portability: Exchange server enables a company’s employees /users to securely access email messages, instant messaging, voice mails, video calls and SMS texts from anywhere in the world. All they need is a computing device of their choice (a laptop, desktop, tablet or mobile phones) and an internet connection.

• Cloud Computing benefits: Exchange allows the users to move to the cloud on their terms – be it immediate on-boarding to the cloud or managing a hybrid deployment with on-premises and online mailboxes to meet their business needs.

It provides the end users a seamless experience that includes sharing multiple calendars and scheduling meetings between on-premises and online users.

• Agility: Exchange server helps in decreasing the amount of time spent in managing the messaging systems providing very flexible control, and thus, enhancing the speed of the processes.It also manages most of the powerful capabilities that include Apps for Outlook, DLP, and site mailboxes from the Exchange Administration Centre – a single, handy, web-based administration interface.

How do Emails work?

Before we understand how exchange server works, let us discuss how email works.At first, the user creates and sends a message to an email client that uses the Microsoft Exchange Server. In the beginning, they need to connect or link the account to the server. This happens automatically upon signing in.Once the message is sent, it goes to the server and will be stored in certain server’s database location.

The moment an email message is stored in the database of the exchange server, they are routed to the appropriate client by sending a notification to their account.As soon as the receiver’s account gets the notification that there is an incoming message from the server (this requires an internet connection in the client’s system), the server transfers the message to the recipient’s inbox. Soon after that, the recipient can open the message.

(This is how email practically works.)

Now let us discuss How Exchange Server works

Exchange server has four primary components which work hand-in-hand to run the process smoothly.

The components of the mail exchange server are:

1.) Information Store: This is the place where email messages are stored, located and organized.

2.)System Attendant: It makes these messages relevant to the client sending and receiving the

message. In other words, it creates and manages email addresses.

3.)  Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP): This is the component that plays the vital role. It allows inter-server message transmission. Often messages are supposed to be relayed from one server to another, especially in the case where the location of the recipient client is quite far, and/or is using a non-Microsoft email provider.

4.) Active Directory: Its job is to update the system attendant with new mailbox information. It also manages user accounts and distribution lists by itself.With the functionalities of the individual components, their roles are clear. Hence, Microsoft Exchange Server requires all of the components mentioned above to deliver flawless service to the user.

The user can thus create new email accounts, manage various forms of data, such as calendars, address books and emails. Rest assured, the sent emails are delivered to the inbox where it is supposed to be so that the communication between the users is quick and efficient.

Exchange Server Version List

Apart from Exchange Server, Microsoft has sold many simpler email products, but this is entirely new and a remarkable one. It is X.400 based client-server mail system that comes with a single database store supported by X.500 directory services.

Exchange Server’s directory eventually became Microsoft’s Active Directory service( a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol(LDAP)-compliant directory service. Later, it was integrated into Windows 2000 as the foundation of Windows Server domains.

Exchange server 4.0 was released in March 1996 and it tops in the exchange server version list. There were five service packs (SP) released over a couple of years.The latest release, exchange server -2016 came up with a few spectacular features and multi-compatibility solutions:

• Combine roles: The number of available roles came down to two – Mail Box Server and Edge Transport.
• Office 365 hybrid: The Hybrid Configuration Wizard (HCW), formerly included with Exchange 2013 is going to change into a cloud-based application. When the user chooses to a hybrid deployment in the current version, he must download and install the wizard as a small app.
• Outlook on the web: It was formerly known as an Outlook Web App and the latest release has a few changes in the UI.

Microsoft Exchange Server 2016 Architecture

With the release of Exchange Server 2016 Microsoft took the opportunity to simplify some of the architecture complexity that was present in previous versions. It also includes new features which make communication and collaboration easier. Microsoft has changed the way Exchange deployment has been done for the last few releases. Implementation is now easier, the configuration is simpler, and upgrading has fewer steps. The number of servers required have been reduced, as have licensing costs and infrastructure requirements. Hybrid deployments are also much easier using on premise and Exchange Online or Office 365, which can further reduce the required on premise infrastructure.

Microsoft simplified the architecture by removing the Exchange 2013 Client Access Server role and added it as a service on the Exchange 2016 Mailbox Server Role. Now there is just one Exchange 2016 Mailbox Server role with Client Access and Transport services included on it. The Edge Transport Server is retained from the previous versions of Exchange and provides inbound and outbound mail routing as well as anti-spam, antivirus, and content connection filtering via address rewriting to protect internal servers.

Exchange Server 2016 installation step by step

Exchange Server On-Premise

Advantages of On-Premise Server

1. Full Control of all activities
   • The Hardware and Email Platform are only used by the particular organization with full control.
   • The organization will decide on the configuration, the upgrades and changes and timing. It can be applied to the infrastructure at the time convenient to business.
   • Maintenance of the server, installation of the updates and hardware related problems needs to be monitored by the organization.
   • While using On-premise Exchange Server, organization can decide the desired size of the mailboxes.
   • Freedom to implement as many services as desired to its users with ActiveSync, transport rules, Webmail, public folders, etc.
   • Options like Server-updates, backups, restarts or shutdowns can be controlled & performed at any time convenient by the organization.
2. Flexibility for customizations
   • The On-Premise Exchange Server supports more flexibility while providing integration to external systems or third party applications that will work with MS Exchange. It is easier to interconnect between Exchange & other application servers as long as both are hosted on same local network.
   • Email for malfunction printers, notification messages for Customer Relationship management, Communication for receiving faxes through emails, etc. can be set as per requirements.
3. Control of Exchange Data
   • The integrity and longevity of the Exchange data depends on the organization.
   • It is under the control of the business to decide when to take backup of the mailbox databases and how the backup can be stored or destroyed.
   • Data is always stored on-premises even if it is using online drives, backup tapes or own remote storage.
4. Other Benefits
   • Using On-Premise Exchange Server enables ability to configure multi-level and high-level security and supports efficiency in use of storage by providing Public folders that allows sharing of one mailbox to all users.
   • Due to end user proximity to Server Performance and information access without internet helps in improving Performance and access times as long as Exchange Server is well configured and setup.

Disadvantages of On-Premise Server

1. Threat of Losing Data
   • As the data is stored in the organization’s hardware, any disaster may lead to loss of email and servers.
   • Losing data might affect business continuity and rebuilding it can be costly.
   • Security of data loss is main concern. To ensure that, organization needs to configure networks, systems and Exchange platform against possible threats.
2. High Expense Involved
   • Setting up Exchange Server On-Premise not only involves initial cost in Licensing but also involves maintenance cost of hardware and applications.
   • Update of new version of Exchange involves different configurations than the earlier one.
   • Hardware used may require replacement after every few years.
3. Availability
   • The two main factors for the better reliability & Uptime of internally hosted Exchange Server depends on Exchange Server configuration and the level of investment the organization is willing to provide for hosting the Exchange Server On-Premise Environment.

-Microsoft Exchange Server 2016 brings a new set of technologies, features, and services to Exchange Server, the messaging platform that provides email, scheduling, and tools for custom collaboration and messaging service applications. Its goal is to support people and organizations as their work habits evolve from a communication focus to a collaboration focus. At the same time, Exchange 2016 helps lower the total cost of ownership whether you deploy Exchange 2016 on-premises or provision your mailboxes in the cloud.

1.Smarter Inbox
Exchange 2016 helps you get more done through faster search and an inbox that is more personalized, more helpful, and more intelligent.

2.Simplified Architecture
A simplified architecture, originally forged in the cloud, combines the mailbox and client access roles, so it’s easier to plan and scale your deployments. Streamlined coexistence with Exchange 2013 means easier upgrading.

3.Better Collaboration
With its new approach to attachments that eliminates versioning headaches, plus other enhancements, Exchange Server 2016 makes working together on documents easier.

4.Mobile Productivity
Exchange Server 2016 powers the latest Outlook experiences on phones, tablets, desktops, and the web so you can get more done, wherever you are.