Hosted Exchange enables you to offer comprehensive messaging services for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), small office/home office (SOHO) businesses, and individual information workers. Based on Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 (SP1) and Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008, this messaging solution provides tools for flexible business modeling. You can offer a broad range of services that go from basic e-mail up to higher value services, such as providing additional storage, hosting personal domains, and calendars.

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 brings a rich set of new technologies, features, and services to this release of the solution. Exchange Server 2007 SP1 is built on the foundation of RTM, and added additional usability, performance, and scalability enhancements.

Microsoft Outlook® Web Access (OWA) provides Hosted Messaging and Collaboration users with a better ubiquitous access experience. Exchange Server 2007 SP1 adds many OWA related features-for example, the Recover Deleted Items feature to retrieve deleted items, and the ability to customize the OWA user interface to seamlessly integrate custom applications.

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 enables a much-more consistent user experience-the Web access experience is more like the Microsoft Outlook client experience. Feature monthly calendar view is back. Public folder is back and users now can access public folders from OWA without having to use the /public virtual directory. Additional language spelling check is also added.

In addition, the access must be secure. Exchange Server 2007 SP1 supports reading and composing signed and encrypted e-mail. By using Outlook 2007 or OWA 2007, users' free/busy information would not be viewed outside the organization without permission-only users within their own organization can view and search free/busy information.

Besides security improvement in OWA like free/busy information and reading/composing signed and encrypted e-mail, Exchange Server 2007 SP1 added many built-in protection features. One is the standby continuous replication (SCR) feature for high availability. It is designed largely for data center recovery.

Exchange Server 2007 introduces a new mechanism for distributing Offline Address Books (OAB) that does not require Public Folders. Outlook 2007 clients can download their OAB through a web-based distribution point published on a Client Access Server (CAS). The potential advantages of the new distribution mechanism include supporting more concurrent clients, reduced bandwidth usage, and more control over the distribution points. Web-based OAB distribution greatly improves scalability.

The following table provides the summary about new features in Hosted Exchange for this release.

Table: New Hosted Exchange Features

Feature Description

Server roles

One of the primary new concepts introduced in Exchange Server 2007 is that of server roles. Instead of one generic installation of Exchange Server, you can now choose from several different roles. These roles are designed to logically group the features that are required to accomplish a set of tasks. The Exchange Server 2007 server roles are Hub Transport, Edge Transport, Client Access, Mailbox, and Unified Messaging.

Note:
The Edge transport role is designed specifically for deploying into a perimeter network. However, there is lag time for both newly created and updated accepted domains and accepted users on the Edge server because of built in EdgeSync delay replication and cache delay. This can cause undesired NDR messages for hosting organizations. For this reason, we offer an alternative deployment scenario where the Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Hub Transport server can be reached directly through the Internet.

Antivirus and Anti-Spam

In Hosted Messaging and Collaboration version 4.5, an Internet-facing Hub Transport server is recommended to replace the previous Edge server for performance enhancement. There are additional antivirus and anti-spam information because the solution now includes additional guidance on setting them up. Service provider can enhance the service further – for example, for EHS routing, by developing or buying customer agents using the agent architecture. For more information about antivirus and anti-spam, see section Antivirus and Anti-Spam and its subsections.

Web-based OAB distribution

Exchange Server 2007 introduces a new mechanism for distributing Offline Address Books (OAB) that does not require Public Folders. It instead uses HTTP(S) and the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS). Hosted Messaging and Collaboration version 4.5 supports this new distribution mechanism, allowing organizations and users to be provisioned and configured to take advantage of the enhanced functionality.

The above new OWA features are now controllable through MPS SDK provisioning. And the features are added to related user plan.

For more information about web-based OAB distribution, see Web-based OAB Distribution.

Outlook Web Access

Outlook Web Access (OWA) is an ideal client for users who do not have access to Outlook, such as users who are traveling and relying on shared workstations for access to e-mail and calendar information. OWA Premium in Exchange Server 2007 SP1 adds many new features such as rules editing, public folders access, WebReady document viewing for Microsoft Office 2007 file formats, S/MIME support, personal distribution lists, monthly calendar view, recovery of deleted items, additional language support, and custom form support. All of these features make OWA a more consistent user experience with the Outlook features they are used to.

For more information about new OWA features in Exchange Server 2007 SP1, see New Client Access Features in Exchange 2007 SP1.

Mobility

Exchange ActiveSync in Exchange 2007 SP1 includes the following enhancements for the administrator and for the end-user:

  • An Exchange ActiveSync default mailbox policy is created.
  • Remote Wipe confirmation has been added.
  • Direct Push performance enhancements have been added.

Service Providers can monetize these new features and have more precise control of device management. These new ActiveSync mailbox policy settings are generally only available for Windows Mobile 6.1 devices. As the devices become more generally available on the market, Microsoft will add the support to the Hosted Messaging and Collaboration Solution. Hosted service administrators can use Exchange Management Console or Exchange Management Shell to manage the new settings. For more information about the new Exchange ActiveSync features in Exchange 2007 SP1 see section Hosted Mobile Messaging.

Resource Mailbox

Hosted Messaging and Collaboration version 4.5 includes the creation, management, and deletion of Resource Mailboxes. This allows resellers, hosters and business administrators the option of managing resource mailboxes.

Performance improvements

New Exchange Server 2007 SP1 features enable great performance efficiency in several areas. These areas include removal of scalability limits in RTM version, enhanced CAS performance, reduced RAM requirement per storage group for the mailbox server, and faster failover time for CCR.

Unified Messaging/Office Communications Server 2007 services integration

Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging-enabled users can receive all voice mail, e-mail messages in their Exchange Server 2007 mailboxes and can access their mailboxes from a variety of devices. These devices include mobile devices and cellular, analog, or digital telephones.

Unified Messaging has been improved and has added new features in Exchange 2007 SP1. To use some of these features, you must correctly deploy Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 in your environment. For more information about how to plan and deploy Exchange 2007 SP1 and Office Communications Server 2007 in your Unified Messaging environment, and about new features in Exchange 2007 SP1, see What's New in Exchange Server 2007 SP1.

For more information see: