We have an Exchange 2010 server and when an internal user emails another internal user, the email is routed directly to the recipient's mailbox without passing through the MX record destination. In our case we have an external email service (Google G Suite) that we are directing all mail through before it is bounced (pass through) to our internal server. This is because we are doing a phased migration to the Google platform. When an internal user sends to a user who has already been migrated, their email never leaves Exchange...thus never appears in their Google mailbox. I have read the VERY MANY steps to setting up Google as a remote SMTP server (SMTP Virtual Server Relay) and forcing Exchange to send through that...but this seems like the wrong solution. I do not need my Exchange server to send using Google's SMTP server...I just want it to actually SEND the email like any other email that would be leaving the organization rather than looking inside first. Seems like this should be a simple boolean setting (resolve DNS/MX? y/n)...but I can't find any documentation.
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Why the downvote? Seems like a legit question, posted properly, with all relevant info. Don't be a hater. – techtheatre Jan 13 '17 at 04:56
2 Answers
The steps you read are the correct solution. Think about this for a second. Your server is configured to accept delivery of mail for example.com. When an internal user sends to another internal user, exchange knows it is the authoritative server for that domain and just routes it internally.
For this not to happen, you would need to convince the server that it is not the authoritative server for example.com, which would be easy enough, but would have the side effect of the server not accepting any mail for that domain, from internal or external sources.
So, trust the documents you're reading.
I've performed many of these migrations in the past and by far the most simple method was to configure dual-delivery in Google (so that it delivers mail to both Exchange and the Google mailbox) and then set Google as the MX. Once that's done, users can start using their new mailbox as your mail sync runs in the background.
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Thanks. I will leave this open for a few days to be sure nobody has some other answer (I could swear I have seen this as a setting before somewhere), but if not I will accept your answer and give up my quest for a more simple approach. – techtheatre Jan 13 '17 at 04:58
It isn't possible to force Exchange to send all email out to an external server without some kind of dual delivery. It will always look to see if the recipient is local and send the email there. Even if you type the email address in, rather than use the GAL it will still deliver local as Exchange and Outlook just use the email address as a lookup tool against the directory. That behaviour cannot be changed.
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