Question : After eseutil /d, Exch 2000 12.5GB DB but only 27MB free after online defrag?

I am running Exchange 2000 as part of SBS 2000 and have been hovering around the 16GB cap for some time now. I'm working on a replacement, but in the meantime I have to deal with this. I got the users to do some housekeeping and used Exmerge to do some more myself and then ran eseutil /d. The size of my .edb and .stm files come to a total of 12.5GB. However, after I ran the eseutil, I backed it up and ran an online defrag and the event 1221 at it's completion tells me that I only have 27MB free! My thinking is that it means 27MB free within that 12.5GB, not relative to the 16GB cap. Can someone confirm, or deny, that? If I'm wrong then I must've done something majorly wrong and am in for another LOOOOOOONNNGGGG night!

Thanks!

John

Answer : After eseutil /d, Exch 2000 12.5GB DB but only 27MB free after online defrag?

While you and tigermatt adequately explained whitespace and the offline vs online defrags, the original (and only) question was "My thinking is that it means 27MB free within that 12.5GB, not relative to the 16GB cap. Can someone confirm, or deny, that?"  I didn't think that question was directly answered, and was merely attempting to do so .