Outlook Hangs on System Adminstrator, Read and Delivery Receipts

[chrisukcov]

Morning All.

We are having a problem where more and more people are calling our helpdesk to say that their mailbox has frozen.
Upon investigating we find that its when they have the read,delivery or system administrator (mailbox full) receipts selected. On most peoples this freezes their Outlook completely and even after 20 mins it doesnt kick back into life, on some peoples it will just hang for 40 seconds or so and then be ok. But obviously this is a pain.

Whats happened recently:

We have always had this problem but only very, very infrequently. But we have migrated from exchange 2000 to 2003 in the last few months and at present have some people running off the new 2003 exchange server and some off the old 2000 server. We also replicate to another 2003 server in the organisation that hosts mail just for one site.

Has anyone got any ideas?

Thanks in advance
Chris

 

[jhaith]

What are the Storage Limit settings for warning, prohibit send, and prohibit send/recieve in Exchange? And when are they scheduled to be sent?

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

Hello,

For majority its

40mb Warning
45 Prohibit Send
50 Prohibit Send/Receive

As for the schedule of messages to be sent I have no idea, i assumed they get sent to the user as soon as the limits been breached, but if you know where i can check im more than happy to.

Chris

 

[jhaith]

Having problems trying to figure this one out, have a few more questions though to get some more background on the environment.


1. Are there any specific settings in Outlook that are changed from default settings?
2. Any special network settings client computers use?
3. Are there any consistency in the type of mail users are getting when Outlook stops responding (ex: Large attachments, the sys admin notice, etc)?
4. Whats the basic intranet layout? (client pc->exchange)

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

Thanks.

1. Nope straight out of the box settings
2. Standard network settings DHCP, DNS etc
3. Its only hanging on Read receipts, Delivery reports and messages from exchange saying your mailbox is over its limit etc. Normal user to user msgs are fine whatever the shape or size.
4. Its happening to users who are on the same site and subnet as the exchange server, and to users who are on the end of a wan link. We use a managed BT network.

 

[jhaith]

Are there any other messaging, scheduling, etc programs that users use, or that are installed on the server?

Are users set to automatically send read reciepts?

Sorry for so many questions, trying to narrow things down.... =)

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

Theres a program that is installed on the old exchange server that can auto reply to meeting requests sent to meeting room mailboxes, apart from that thats it.

Nope, users have the choice on whether to have read and delivery receipts.

Thanks for your help

 

[jhaith]

Is that an in house program or 3rd party? If 3rd party whats the name?

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

Its called AutoAccept Sink by Juniper Networks (freebie i think)

You program it to monitor mailboxes and autoaccept the meetings if the calendars free.

Chris

 

[jhaith]

Hmm... was hoping you were using something along the lines of Suns Outlook Connecter, have seen that cause problems with read reciepts. Didn't find much documentation on AutoAccept Sink, but it don't look like it would cause any problems similar to what you're having. I'd try and verify there weren't any problems w/ the migration as far as corruption. Have you ran Isinteg and Eseutil since the migration? If there isn't any corruption I'm out of ideas =(

Would like to hear the solution though if you figure it out.

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

We found this and have a hunch it may be down to this?

Whats your views?
System messages such as NDR's and mailbox size limit warning are special
messages which use a special form. Opening these messages will result in the
client searching for your orgforms folder in order to locate the form. Check
to be sure the orgforms public folder is in a location that is accessible to
the clients and that a replica exists in all your sites to optimize
performance.

Chris

 

[jhaith]

Hmm... sounds like it could be a solution. That would make sense being as some users are running off of 2000, 2003, and then another 2003 that is replicated right? I'd check to make sure the public folders are replicating over to the other servers and everyone has correct permissions. If the templates weren't replicated over they'd have different guid's and that could also cause problems (I believe).

-jhaith

 

[chrisukcov]

With help from Microsoft Advisor (free!)

It was my pleasure to assist you in resolving the issue of “outlook hangs on trying to open system administrator mails”. As per our discussion/email, your existing support case will now be archived. If you find that the issue has not been completely resolved, or you have any follow up questions, please contact me so that I can further assist you.

Here is a summary of your case:

Problem Description

Issue:

· outlook hangs on trying to open system administrator mails

Resolution

· Ran outlook in safe mode.

· The issue still persisted.

· Added the GAREX01 server in the replication list of organizational form in the Eform registry.

· Now everything is working fine.


All sorted!

Chris