Exchange moves to 64bit path - Network IT Week

Exchange moves to 64bit path - Network IT Week

Now that support for Exchange 5.5 has ended many people will be thinking of upgrading (there's a lot of 5.5 users out there), should they upgrade to Exchange 2003 or wait for 12?

Version 12 will ONLY run on 64bit architechtures which may be a good thing in terms of server software, but users will also be forced to upgrade their hardware.

It should mean a much more scalable platform. MS were thinking of replacing the datastore that Exchange users to MS SQL (or a derivative) - which may still happen, the current store uses the JET database engine (like Access), however with the move to 64bit the speed and other advantages aren't so apparent, which means they are likely to stick with what they've got for a while.

So it might be worth waiting and just jump to Exchange 12 on upgraded hardware.