Windows Server 2008 Core remote connectivity.

March 7, 2008

Greetings.

I have created a new Windows Server 2008 Core Enterprise Edition

server, that I am going to use with Hyper-V to run a couple of test

servers (hopefully I will be able to make them production once Hyper-V

is RTM'ed).

I have been able to change its IP, join it to the domain. I have

enabled remote management through the firewall. Using another Windows

Server 2008, I am able to use a domain account to connect to the Core

server with Computer Manager and the Firewall MMC as well.

The only thing I seem to be unable to do in Computer Manager is use

the Disk Management part of Computer Manager. Every time I try, I get

the pop-up error "The RPC server is unavailable".

I have even gone so far as to turn the firewall off completely on the

Core server just to remove that as a potential issue, which did not

help.

The only clue I seem to have is that I have the following event log

entry on the server:

Log Name: System

Source: storflt

Date: 3/7/2008 8:44:29 AM

Event ID: 5

Task Category: None

Level: Warning

Keywords: Classic

User: N/A

Computer: HOSVMSERVER.sheehans.org

Description:

The Virtual Storage Filter Driver is disabled through the registry. It

is inactive for all disk drives.

Event Xml:

<Channel>System</Channel>

<Computer>HOSVMSERVER.sheehans.org</Computer>

</System>

<Data>

</Data>

<Binary>00000000010000000000000005000680000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</

Binary>

</EventData>

</Event>

Has anyone run into this before?

I am running this server on a system with an Intel ICH9R RAID

controller. I have 4 disks in a RAID 1+0 configuration. I have tried

the current publicly available driver/chipset pack from Intel, and a

pre-release pack to see if that had anything to do with this error.

Nothing seems to make the error go away.

I would really like to get the remote disk management piece working so

I can carve up the RAID 1+0. Also it would be nice to have a machine

where I didn't have any errors in the logs (warnings or not) before I

started using it.

March 8, 2008

Re: Windows Server 2008 Core remote connectivity.

On Mar 7, 9:17 am, Dan Sheehan <sheeh...@sheehans.org> wrote:

> Greetings.

> I have created a new Windows Server 2008 Core Enterprise Edition

> server, that I am going to use with Hyper-V to run a couple of test

> servers (hopefully I will be able to make them production once Hyper-V

> is RTM'ed).

> I have been able to change its IP, join it to the domain. I have

> enabled remote management through the firewall. Using another Windows

> Server 2008, I am able to use a domain account to connect to the Core

> server with Computer Manager and the Firewall MMC as well.

> The only thing I seem to be unable to do in Computer Manager is use

> the Disk Management part of Computer Manager. Every time I try, I get

> the pop-up error "The RPC server is unavailable".

> I have even gone so far as to turn the firewall off completely on the

> Core server just to remove that as a potential issue, which did not

> help.

>

> The only clue I seem to have is that I have the following event log

> entry on the server:

> Log Name: System

> Source: storflt

> Date: 3/7/2008 8:44:29 AM

> Event ID: 5

> Task Category: None

> Level: Warning

> Keywords: Classic

> User: N/A

> Computer: HOSVMSERVER.sheehans.org

> Description:

> The Virtual Storage Filter Driver is disabled through the registry. It

> is inactive for all disk drives.

> Event Xml:

> <Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">

> <System>

> <Provider Name="storflt" />

> <EventID Qualifiers="32774">5</EventID>

> <Level>3</Level>

> <Task>0</Task>

> <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>

> <TimeCreated SystemTime="2008-03-07T13:44:29.684Z" />

> <EventRecordID>541</EventRecordID>

> <Channel>System</Channel>

> <Computer>HOSVMSERVER.sheehans.org</Computer>

> <Security />

> </System>

> <EventData>

> <Data>

> </Data>

>

> <Binary>00000000010000000000000005000680000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</

> Binary>

> </EventData>

> </Event>

>

> Has anyone run into this before?

>

> I am running this server on a system with an Intel ICH9R RAID

> controller. I have 4 disks in a RAID 1+0 configuration. I have tried

> the current publicly available driver/chipset pack from Intel, and a

> pre-release pack to see if that had anything to do with this error.

> Nothing seems to make the error go away.

>

> I would really like to get the remote disk management piece working so

> I can carve up the RAID 1+0. Also it would be nice to have a machine

> where I didn't have any errors in the logs (warnings or not) before I

> started using it.

I forgot to add that I did make sure the Virtual Disk Service is

running and set to automatic.

I am even able to get to the read only Device Manager, so it's

something specific to the Virtual Disk Service.

March 10, 2008

Re: Windows Server 2008 Core remote connectivity.

Sorry, I don't have a solution at this time, but I'll continue to

investigate of and on - not sure if I'll find a solution or not.

For Windows XP, Server 2003 the Program Exceptions listed below are required

to allow remote disk management. I think the relevant entries are the ones

for dmadmin.exe and dmremote.exe (this is extracted from the settings report

in GPMC for the GPO I use to enable the Windows Firewall).

With these settings, I could use Disk Management from a Windows Server 2003

SP1 computer to manage disks on a Windows Server 2008 Full Installation that

has the Windows Firewall enabled (actually formatted a partition remotely).

However, from Vista SP1 (sorry, don't have second 2008 server in this

environment) I got the "The RPC Server is Unavailable" and then in the

Computer Management Status (bottom of the right pane) "Unable to connect to

the Virtual Disk Service". Seems that Vista (and presumably Server 2008)

are using a different mechanism than Windows Server 2003 to communicate with

the disk management services remotely. (Using Computer Management from the

Vista computer I was able to do other remote management tasks - e.g.

start/stop services, create/manage shares, view Event Log Entries).

I turned on logging in the Windows Firewall on the 2008 server, but nothing

was reported as being blocked.

SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsFirewall\DomainProfile\AuthorizedApplications\List\%systemroot%\system32\dmadmin.exe:*:enabled:Disk

Management %systemroot%\system32\dmadmin.exe:*:enabled:Disk Management

SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsFirewall\DomainProfile\AuthorizedApplications\List\%systemroot%\system32\dmremote.exe:*:enabled:Remote

Disk Management %systemroot%\system32\dmremote.exe:*:enabled:Remote Disk

Management

SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsFirewall\DomainProfile\AuthorizedApplications\List\%systemroot%\system32\sessmgr.exe:*:enabled:sessmgr.exe

%systemroot%\system32\sessmgr.exe:*:enabled:sessmgr.exe

--

Bruce Sanderson

http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders/

It's perfectly useless to know the right answer to the wrong question.

"Dan Sheehan" <sheehand@sheehans.org> wrote in message

news:15170152-aeea-4a45-aa8b-fa9655bcd854@o77g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...