Thursday, August 23, 2012

Native SharePoint upgrade from 2003 to 2010/2013



Well, believe it or not, there are still a large number of SharePoint 2.0 users out there. Yes, that is 2.0… as in 2003… as in 9 years old. At this point, those users are contemplating one of two things: start from scratch on 2010, or actually take the time to upgrade their current 2003 environment(s) to 2010 (or even 2013).
Needless to say, the upgrade path from 2003 to 2010 can be a bit overwhelming. Just like all previous majorreleases of the SharePoint product, there is no way to upgrade directly from 2003 to 2010; you must first upgrade from 2003 to the 2007 version. I know it sounds complicated, but before you decide to scrap everything and start from scratch, let’s take a closer look at what’s involved for the upgrade process.Speaking from experience, making the upgrade from 2003 to SharePoint 2010 isn’t really as tough as it sounds.
The most difficult part of the upgrade is having the required hardware and software, as well as space available to backup the environment in case any issues arise during the upgrade. *It may seem obvious to some our readers, but it’s worth noting that upgrading to SharePoint 2010 will take an entire new server utilizing 64-bit hardware.