Microsoft announced last November that it would ship Exchange 12 only for 64-bit systems. Microsoft logic says that the world is fast becoming a 64-bit environment and that moving to 64-bit helps to solve some technical problems Exchange has on the 32-bit platform. Let's look at the technical issues behind Microsoft's decision and how the move to 64-bit systems will affect Exchange customers.
Microsoft's Dilemma
In the past decade, message and mailbox sizes have grown and servers have been required to support increasing numbers of concurrent authenticated connections. In addition, server consolidation means that Exchange servers support more mailboxes than ever and that storage systems are larger and more complex. Web Table 1 shows how changing configurations have increased the pressure on Exchange.
Microsoft's dilemma was whether to continue with a 32-bit version of Exchange during the development of 64-bit Exchange 12. Keeping a 32-bit version would have let customers use their existing hardware while moving to Exchange 12, and Microsoft could have told customers that Exchange 12 would be the last 32-bit version and prepared them to move to 64-bit in the next release. But that release might not occur until 2010, and keeping a 32-bit version would have kept Microsoft from addressing problems such as virtual memory fragmentation, which prevents the Information Store (IS) from scaling up. . . .
Register
