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Microsoft 365 Minimal or Cutoff Migration?
Hello, I am currently running an on-premises Server 2016 domain with Active Directory and Exchange 2016 with around 65 users. I am starting to plan for migrating our Exchange server to Microsoft...
- You can re-enable sync after the migration, that's not a problem. Do note that if you plan to decommission Exchange, having AAD Connect in the mix puts you in an unsupported configuration. Every configuration involving dirsync/AAD Connect requires you to keep at least one Exchange box for management purposes.
Thank you for the information, Vasil. Since you mention that if I did decommission Exchange it would be in an unsupported state, what would be the recommendation for managing local Active Directory users and their mailboxes? Say, for example, a new user needed to be created, is the recommendation, without having AAD Connect, for you to create the user on your local Domain Controller in Active Directory, then as a second step create their mailbox in the Exchange admin center? It just seems like it would be far easier to manage things like that with AAD Connect still syncing users/passwords. I'm curious what other people normally do in a situation like this. Do most people really choose to keep Exchange running even though it's not needed when all mailboxes are migrated to MS365?
That's the only supported configuration. It's a pain yes, but using the Exchange management tools is the only supported way to manage Exchange related objects and attributes. If you don't care about the "supported" bit, it's perfectly possible to do it with AD tools/PowerShell.
- Thank you for the clarification. I think for now I will start with the 'Minimal' option and see how easy things are to manage with Exchange still being in the mix and decide later whether to fully decommission it or not.