Testing Exchange Connectivity

Missy Koslosky — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 21:22:25 GMT

The Microsoft Exchange Product Group has a pretty cool tool available online (in Beta) that I learned about at the E14 Airlift (don't worry, it's not for Exchange 14), called the Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Connectivity Analyzer. This tool offers several tests that can be run against your Exchange infrastructure to see if things are configured correctly, including:

MS Exchange ActiveSync Test, which simulates a mobile device connecting to Exchange Server
MS Exchange ActiveSync Autodiscover Test, which simulates the steps a mobile device takes to connect to the AutoDiscover service
MS Outlook 2007 Autodiscovery Connectivity Test, which simulates the steps Outlook 2007 takes to connect to the AutoDiscovery service
MS Outlook 2003 RPC/HTTP Connectivity Test, which simulates the steps Outlook 2003 takes to connect to Exchange using RPC over HTTP
Inbound SMTP Email Test, which simulates sending e-mail to your Exchange Server using SMTP

It's a pretty cool tool - you first choose one of the radio buttons, then simply click Next. You're then presented with fields where you enter your server name (obviously, use the Internet-facing name here) and your credentials (they do want a domain password, but they promise to not store it and to use SSL to encrypt it, as always YMMV, and use caution). There's also a challenge in the form of one of those annoyingly garbled strings of letters that are hard to see, but that keep automated systems from using the form. I hate these things and always mess up the first try, but understand why they're there.) Once you've filled out the forms and agreed to the terms of service, a simple click is all it takes to start the test. I just ran through the test, using 3Sharp as the target, and here's a snippet from our results (with some of the fields changed, which I've italicized. My goal is to show you what kind of results you'd see, not to show you everything we do here at 3Sharp):

Attempting to Resolve the host name server.3sharp.com in DNS.
Host successfully Resolved
Additional Details
IP(s) returned: 1.1.1.1

Testing TCP Port 443 on host server.3sharp.com to ensure it is listening/open.
The port was opened successfully.

Testing SSLCertificate for validity.
The certificate passed all validation requirements.
Additional Details
Subject: CN=server.3sharp.com, OU=Domain Control Validated, O=server.3sharp.com, Issuer SERIALNUMBER=12345678, CN=Go Daddy Secure Certification Authority, OU=http://certificates.godaddy.com/repository, O="GoDaddy.com, Inc.", L=Scottsdale, S=Arizona, C=US

Testing Http Authentication Methods for URL https://server.3sharp.com/Microsoft-Server-Activesync/
Http Authentication Methods are correct
Additional Details
Found all expected authentication methods and no disallowed methods Methods Found: Basic realm="server.3sharp.com"

Attempting an Activesync session with server
Errors were encountered while testing the ActiveSync session
Test Steps
Attempting to send OPTIONS command to server
Testing the OPTIONS command failed. See Additional Details for more info
Additional Details
A Web Exception occured because an HTTP 401 - Unauthorized response was received from IIS6

All in all, it's a pretty cool tool, and alleviates the need for you to get to a remote desktop to test your environment's connectivity. I was surprised I hadn't heard about it before, and thought I'd share this so more folks can try out the site!

Synchronization Problems with EAS or Entourage?

Missy Koslosky — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 00:11:17 GMT

Note: I've added an update from the nice folks at Vision Works Solutions to the end of this post. The complete information they sent along is in the comments, but I added it to this post so the information doesn't get overlooked.

Earlier today, I ran across an interesting issue - apparently several (mostly small - several running SBS) organizations have run into issues where Exchange ActiveSync or Entourage client sync fails when there are more than just a couple (and I mean as few as four) items in a folder. There is no correlation between the inability to synch and a specific folder or folder type - the issue has happened with contacts, the calendar, and just the standard Inbox folder. There aren't neessarily helpful error messages associated with this issue - timeouts are often seen, and the hex value 0×85010014 has also been seen.

This issue often is related to a third-party kernel driver - famv4.sys (File Access Manager, from Vision Works Solutions, Inc.). This file is used by some backup vendors to allow backup software access to open files. Generally, the backup vendors using this file are smaller vendors instead of the big-name software companies.

To isolate whether famv4.sys is causing problems with synch operations, you can disable famv4.sys through the registry:

Open regedt32 (or regedit, whichever) on the server
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services
Find "famv4" (no quotes)
Change the value of "Startup" for famv4 to 4 (this disables the service)
Close the registry editor
Open a command prompt on the server
Type "net stop famv4" (no quotes), hit enter

If your ActiveSync or Entourage (or both) clients can synchronize now, you've isolated the problem - the bad news is that your backup software isn't going to work right now, so make sure you either a) go back and re-enable famv4.sys in the registry or b) sort out a different way to back up the server -- which option you take depends upon what will work best in your environment.

If you experience this problem, you should contact your backup vendor to report the issue and request a fix. You may also want to contact Vision Works Solutions (link above) so they are also aware of the problem.

This problem is also discussed by someone who's experienced it here: http://www.mytechnicallife.com/2008/08/20/exchange-2007entourage-famv4sys-issue-summary-from-microsoft/

Here's hoping this one doesn't bite you.

(Question: Why is synchronization abbreviated sync instead of synch?? I really feel like the trailing "h" needs to be there; it just feels incomplete without it. So I use "synch" mostly. Except when I don't. I claim no reliability on this issue.)

Update:

File Access Manager allows backup applications to open exclusively opened files for backup. Several different backup software companies license our driver FAMv4.sys from us and distribute it.

This incompatibility is common with file system filter drivers and we already resolved the incompatibility in the latest release of File Access Manager. You can obtain Version 4.1.7 at the below link.

Updates can be found here: http://www.vwsolutions.com/FAM/trial.aspx

For any future updates or questions you can reach our support techs here:

http://www.vwsolutions.com/support/submitTicket.aspx