Information store won't start

[wfooshee]

Customer has 2 servers, both Domain Controllers in a Windows 2003 AD domain. I believe the domain is running mixed mode. One server is running Exchange.
Customer rebooted servers this morning as is his Monday habit. After starting, the Information Store will not start, cannot find a Global Catalog. The other server is the Global Catalog server and has FSMO roles. No replication has succeeded since the reboot.

Running nltest /dsgetdc:domain.com from either server reports only that server. Adding /gc or /pdc works OK from the GC server, but fails from the Exchange server.

A colleague asked about removing AD from the Exchange box, but I know better. No DCPROMO (either direction) after Exchange is up and running.

Running nltest /dnsgetdc:domain.com from either server list both domain controllers, and adding /gc or /pdc works at both servers. That implies (to me) that DNS is working, yet the first reason give for each AD failure in the Event Viewer is failure to resolve the server name by DNS.

Suggestions on where to continue troubleshooting, where to find a fix? I'd really rather not have to zap all the mailboxes to PSTs and rebuild the box.

 

[58sniper]

Customer rebooted servers this morning as is his Monday habit.

There's problem #1.

I'd really rather not have to zap all the mailboxes to PSTs and rebuild the box.

That would be problem #2, cuz trying to exmerge with no IS would be fun.

I believe it to be a DNS issue as well.

Once you get it all up and running, might as well make that Exchange box a GC.



Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[wfooshee]

Well, I have good news and bad news.

Good news is that I don't have to rebuild any servers, I've got it working.

Bad news is that I wasted nearly 6 hours troubleshooting.

During my troubleshooting I found that I couldn't Remote Desktop to this server, and none of the antivirus clients could contact it for updates. It's starting to look like firewall behavior, and sure enough, Windows Firewall was on when I thought to look. Who sets up Windows Firewall on a SERVER??!?!??!?!?

Turned it off, everything is 100% operational.

At least I didn't rebuild anything before I found that.

 

[baddos]

It's actually best practice to have windows firewall enabled with the exceptions list modified for the services your server is actually providing. This is especially true for your servers.

 

[58sniper]

Yep. Microsoft even supplies the Security Configuration Wizard for configuring firewall and other related settings on servers.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[wfooshee]

Server is behind a well-configured hardware firewall at the gateway, I find software firewalls redundant in that situation, and an unnecessary management hassle.

 

[baddos]

It's not redundant, because there are other hosts inside your firewall that can get nasty software installed upon them or just having a rogue employee wanting to do harm.

 

[Zelandakh]

Customers should not have access to servers.
Rebooting servers every Monday is stupid.
Exchange on a GC isn't supported.
Firewalls are on servers for a reason. Use them.

 

[reynolwi]

I second zelandakh on what he said. Especially rebooting servers every monday. A server is designed and built to run basically 24/7/365 and rebooting every week is just putting more wear on that server from just rebooting than it just sitting there running constantly. The server hardware is designed to be run constantly.

Exchange on a domain controller is also a stupid move and like zelandakh said you can not have a global catalog on an exchange server.

Wm. Reynolds
Premise Communications
Texas Public Safety Solutions

http://www.rrwds.com

http://www.txpubsafety.com

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Network Error:
Hit any user to continue

 

[58sniper]

Server is behind a well-configured hardware firewall at the gateway

ok, that slows down evil from the OUTSIDE, but doesn't do anything for evil on the INSIDE. SCW on Exchange helps harden the server even more. And, since it shuts down services that aren't necessary, some could say it makes the server perform better.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/