Exchange 2010 is a 64bit server which includes enhanced email management, new storage options, different deployment features, built in archiving, database clustering, and an all new Outlook Web Access client. This version of Exchange is something of a hybrid, built to serve as either part of a hosted architecture or a corporate one. The hosted version has yet to be made available so the jury is out on the productivity option of that, but the corporate version has been well and truly tested.

Microsoft already hosts Live@Edu users on the new platform, and there are over 5 million of them. So you could say it is the biggest beta test around. It gave Microsoft an excellent live proving ground to analyze how it was used, and how the new features handled a real workload. It also gave them plenty of opportunity to optimize the code and fix as many bugs as they could before launch.

The software giant had said in a previous release that Exchange 2010 had been specifically designed for high availability and cross domain integration using Server 2008 clustering and other features. This is apparently what prompted the hosted version of Exchange.

While Exchange 2010 improves on many of the shortcomings of the previous versions, it also makes rolling it out much more complicated. For a start it’s 64bit only, it needs Server 2008 to work properly and that usually means new or at least recent hardware. Testers so far are skeptical about achieving high levels of availability to begin with because of the complexity of the system and its requirements.

To achieve a good level of service with massive amounts of data, multiple copies of databases, load balancing and differing server roles is going to take a lot of planning and a meticulous attention to detail to get right. Those who take the time to get it right first time will reap the rewards of what will be a very stable system.

Clustering technology, replication, multiple databases and low cost disk support means that reliability and scalability can be built on an existing foundation by replicating small servers within and between data centers.

Exchange 2010 is the first in a host of new Microsoft Office products being released over the next year. The others include Office 2010, Office Communications Manager 2010, Visio 2010, Project 2010 and Sharepoint Server 2010. It’s going to be a busy year in the IT departments of some larger corporations.

Microsoft announced that the new Exchange Server 2010 will ship by the end of the year. It released the final beta recently along with Forefront for Exchange Server 2010 which is a security add-on for the server software.

The design philosophy of the new Exchange is that of a hybrid. It is designed to work equally well as a hosted email service as it is a corporate one. The flexibility and scalability touted in previous press releases certainly hint at a much more robust and flexible approach to the software.

Microsoft has tested the application thoroughly using its own infrastructure, and the Live@Edu programme. This programme was a free offering to students which offered a co-hosted Exchange setup free of charge with ten gigabytes of storage per user and an online storage facility called SkyDrive which enables students to add files to cloud based network folders.

The software giant also used its own corporate network to host the new Exchange 2010 infrastructure. In a statement they said that it was the perfect way to iron out any last minute issues while serving thousands of mailboxes concurrently.

Michael Atalla, the Exchange Group Product Manager announced the release on the team blog this week. He also highlighted some new features such as the interoperability with Exchange 2007 with Service Pack 2, and the ability to co-exist with Server 2003 servers. Initially Exchange 2010 was only going to work on Server 2008 machines, but it may be the case now that is can work with the older OS. There was also added support for 64-bit Server 2008, upgrades from the Exchange 2010 Release Candidate to the Release To Manufacturing version, which is also good news for early adopters. It means now that the RC version can be updated to the RTM rather than being uninstalled and installed anew.

This release is another example of the sea change at Microsoft over the past couple of years. They seem to be listening to users, interacting and consulting with them and even taking some of the feedback on board. We now seem to be getting software that we want, rather than what they want us to have. Windows 7 is another example of a product that has gone though lengthy feedback testing and beta’s before being released to manufacturing.

Microsoft is also attempting to improve the email discovery and compliance aspect of its email platform. Feedback from tester so far indicates that this isn’t ready yet, and probably won’t be at the time of release. It will probably be along in a year in the first Service Pack for Exchange 2010.

While the compliance aspect isn’t fully finished, the improved interface and administrative tools are. They have been received positively so far from Exchange experts around the world as it makes it much easier to maintain the infrastructure and individual users, all from one interface. This cuts down significantly the amount of administration it will take to keep the nodes functioning.

Exchange 2010 is expected to ship at the end of this year.