Ok, what does this mean, how do I figure out where the problem is? Man, what a pain!
Below is an example (PIC 1) of what I’m talking about with the “Unknown”. These “Unknown” machines mean they didn’t send in the Software Update scan on the workstation to the WSUS system. Now, which machines are these? Where do I go? To answer these questions, scroll down to your REPORTING, then REPORTS section and run the following report “Scan 2 – Last scan states by site” under “Software Updates – D. Scan” category, as shown in (PIC 2). After you run the report, you’ll notice a section called “Unknown”, and now open that section and view the “Unknowns”.
To resolve this or at least figure out what’s causing your problems, do the following steps:
Go to the client and open the c:\windows\Windowsupdate.log. It’s best if you can open this log from a machine that has SMS Trace installed. You can view the errors much easier as shown in (PIC 3).
Next look in the c:\windows\system32\ccm\logs\WUAHandler.log and view your errors as shown in (PIC 4).
Then if everything does look good, go to look in the Statesys.log in the SCCM server logs to see if the messages have been updated on the server. If you need to run this manually, you Right Click on Software Updates then click on Run Homepage Summarization, wait a few seconds or check your Statesys.log and then refresh Software Updates and you should see the numbers change.
If none of this is working, then you need to go to the client and from the control panel –> double click on Configuration Manager –> Click on Actions tab –> Click on Software Updates Scan Cycle and click on Initiate Action. Then check if everything is updating correctly with your logs as stated in step 1 and proceeding to step 3.
Pretty much everyone knows when Microsoft releases their software updates every second Tuesday each month. But did you know it’s actually after 10am Pacific Time. Yes, I said Pacific Time. For you peeps that don’t know how to calculate that…that would be 11am Mountain Time, 12 Central Time, 1pm Eastern Time. Now Hawaii, well…now you just getting complicated. Who goes to Hawaii to work anyway. Do they have computers over there? (Things that make you go, Hmmm….)
For any of you that don’t believe me, check out this link to Microsoft.
While I was out doing an installation at a customer I noticed I started having problems with the SQL server’s Windows Application Log. Below you will find the error and the solution on how to resolve this. This took me 3 days and a call to Microsoft to resolve this problem since I couldn’t really find any information online discussing on how to resolve this issue. I feel it’s not a common problem, but no less another problem I had to work through.
ERROR from the Windows Application log on the SQL server:
Event Type: Failure Audit
Event Source: MSSQLSERVER
Event Category: (4)
Event ID: 18456
Date: 1/21/2009
Time: 5:11:36 PM
User: FS\FS-SCCM$
Computer: FS-SQL1
Description:
Login failed for user ‘FS\FS-SCCM$’. [CLIENT: 10.1.255.163]
While I was trying to figure out why I couldn’t get the SMSDBMON.LOG file to stop repeating this error message over and over every second and filling up my server. I was getting desperate and called into MS support. Well, I opened a ticket and they did contact me within 2 hours, but by that time I was so frustrated I decided to try SCCM SP1 (upgrade) since I already tried the “Repair Site” option with no success.
Problem:
Warning: Could not create file e:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Configuration Manager\inboxes\WSUSMgr.box\100.SHA, Error=3.
Solution:
Make sure you delete this role and look at the SUPSetup.LOG and make sure it’s “Uninstalled”. Then run the SCCM SP1 with UPGRADE and reboot server after the upgrade is completed. Then install the Software Update Role.
Server 2008 – The Systems Administrator has set policies to prevent this installation
Today I was onsite at a client and ran across this when trying to install WebDAV X64 on a Server 2008. I figured out how to resolve this by doing the following steps.
Error Message:
Edit registry
Click
Type Regedit
Click Continue
Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer
Greetings everyone, today I ran across a problem with my SCCM and various other things. Basically when I uninstalled SCCM R2 SQL Reporting Services Role, I began to have errors with my Management Point and several other services, and in particular the WSUS role. So, my first steps was to uninstall WSUS and install it again. Well, with no luck when I tried to install the services, I received the error, “Unable to uninstall WSUS due to an error”. So, I tried several things including removing all registry entries containing “WSUS” (DON’T DO THIS!). That’s another Item I learned…don’t remove the WSUS Entries from the REGISTERY.
Instead, do this and you should be ok to install WSUS.
Are you having issues with configuring Asset Intelligence Synchronization Point Role on SCCM??? If you are, it’s most likely the large question, “Where do I get the CERT.PFX file?” Well, it’s usually due to trying to figure out who to contact at Microsoft. No worries now, I’m going to tell you three ways to get this file. First way is to contact Software Assurance or your Microsoft Account Rep. Second way is to let Catapult Systems configure AI for you…in fact, let Catapult System setup and configure your SCCM. Third way and confirmed by my good buddy Jason Sandys, is to wait 90 days after Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 releases for SCCM 2007 SP2. In SCCM 2007 SP2, you will not have the need for CERT.PFX file when configuring the Asset Intelligence Synchronization Role.
Here’s a few tips when configuring Asset Intelligence.
Make sure your server has access on port 443 to the internet.
You can manually synchronize once every 12 hours.
Make sure your hardware and software inventory are turned on within the Client Agents.
When enabling (Figure 1) this make sure this isn’t in the middle of the day or when your SQL server is at it’s peak.
This will increase the data size on SQL, so be prepared…TechNet estimates double in size.
This usually takes time to setup, so be patient like most other pieces of SCCM.
Today SP2 for Server 2008 was released which has Vista SP2 integrated in the same file. My laptop is running x64 Server 2008 with HyperV and the SP2 (577mb) installation took about 45 minutes to install and a reboot. Since my laptop is normally up to date, I don’t know if this would have any difference on the installation time.
While going through the readme notes about SP2 for Server 2008 (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd335036(WS.10).aspx), I stumbled on a great little tool called Service Pack Cleanup Tool. First off, be careful running this. As shown in PIC 1, the prompt does state if you want to remove any previous service packs, you won’t be able to. After running this tool which took about 10 minutes. I was able to free up 2.9gb of space and now I’m not reverting to a previous service pack.
Have you ran across where you keep seeing PC’s show up in your Collections with duplicate names and every time you update and refresh the collection you’ll see a different set of PC’s show duplicates.
Sample
I was seeing this happen while at a customer and it turned out they imaged a machine with ghost and then used that image over and over and over. Well, if they don’t prep that machine correctly with sysprep and the have the SCCM or SMS client already installed, this will cause a problem that you could be tracking down for days.
To resolve this issue, let’s see how many duplicates you have. Create a collection and add the following 3 queries as part of the collection. Then update and refresh your collection.
SMS_R_System.Client from SMS_R_System where SMS_R_System.ResourceID
in (select SMS_GH_System_System.ResourceID from SMS_G_System_System
join SMS_GH_System_System on SMS_G_System_System.ResourceID =
SMS_GH_System_System.ResourceID where SMS_G_System_System.Name <>
SMS_GH_System_System.Name)
Now you should have a list of machines showing duplicate GUIDS in your database. Just FYI, this isn’t always the most accurate, but this allows you a starting place to attach the problem.
Next let’s start attacking the problem, you know everyone has to start somewhere.
“FixMyGuid.bat” @echo off echo starting the FixMyGuid batch file 2 echo copy sleep.exe file copy /Y \\<server name>\package$\FixMyGUID\sleep.exe %windir% sleep 10 /quiet echo copy tranguid.exe file copy /Y \\<server name>\package$\FixMyGUID\tranguid.exe %windir% rem sleep 10 /quiet echo copy CCMDelCert.exe file copy /Y \\<server name>\package$\FixMyGUID\CCMDelCert.exe %windir% sleep 10 /quiet echo running CCMDelCert to repair GUID %windir%\CCMDelCert.exe sleep 10 /quiet net stop ccmexec net start ccmexec rem <remove the rem only if you know a user isn’t on the workstation to reboot the workstation> rem @echo rebooting workstation in 20 seconds rem \\<server name>\package$\FixMyGUID\Pstools\PSSHUTDOWN -r -f \\<computer name>
Now you have the Duplicate GUIDS collection created. Downloaded the files required to reset the GUIDS in the SMSCFG.INI file and created the scripts to download certain files and run exe’s on the workstation to resolve the issue. What I would have liked to add is the last scripts a command to restart the workstation. If your calling the script and you know that no one is on that pc, you can remove the REM commands at the end. We’re nearing the end of the process, we need do the following to prepare for deployment.
Go to SCCM Reports and run report #130 from the Duplicate GUIDS collection.
Export the list to a CSV file and clean the file up.
Then add “Call FinalProcess.bat” before the computer name as shown in #2.
Copy and Paste the list to the CallFinalProcess.bat file
Open a CMD Prompt and run CallFinalProcess.bat file form the server.
On average you’ll have to give the machines at least 5 minutes to update before you’ll see the difference on SCCM. Nothing will hurt if you would like to update and refresh the Duplicate GUID collection. Also, you may have to run the process several times throughout a week or more since some laptops will be disconnected or not turned on.
