VMware VirtualCenter Server service does not start automatically after reboot

We had a problem with our VMware VirtualCenter Server service which did not start automatically after a server reboot. This could be a problem when the VMware VirtualCenter Server service starts before the MSSQL Server.

Now the solution to solve this problem is to add a dependency to the VMware VirtualCenter Server service.

The VirtualCenter Server service is dependent on the following services:

  • SQL Services
  • ADAM Services (when using linked mode in vCenter Server 4.x)

How to create a service dependency:

  1. Open the services.msc
    services.msc
  2. Check out the name of the service you want to add as dependency
    sqlservice
  3. open the Registry Editor (regedit)
  4. Browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\vpxd
  5. Double-click the DependOnService key and add the Service name using the name of the Service in our case MSSQLSERVER
  6. In the Services window, open the service properties for the service VMware VirtualCenter Server.
  7. In the Dependencies tab, verify the VMware VirtualCenter service is listed as depending on the service.

In Windows Server 2008 or later you could also set VMware VirtualCenter Server service to startup type Automatic (Delay):

  1. Click Start > Run, type services.msc, and click OK.
  2. Right-click on the VMware VirtualCenter Server service and click Properties.
  3. Change the startup type from Automatic to Automatic (Delay).
    delaystartup

 
More Information on this: VMware KB

Install SNMP on Hyper-V R2 Core Server

Hyper-V

If your running Microsoft Hyper-V R2 or any Windows Server 2008 R2 Core Server you can install the SNMP Feature on the command line with the command line tool dism.

First you can list all Windows Features

Dism /online /get-features /format:table  

Now you can install for the SNMP Service:

Dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:SNMP-SC

SNMP Feature Core Server

After you have done this you and you have enabled Remote Management you can mange and configure smtp via remote MMC.

SNMP Service

Important: If you need to configure the SNMP Service on a remote machine you have to install the SNMP feature on the local administrative computer. Otherwise you will not see the SNMP specific tabs.

SNMP Service

More Information on installing Windows Features on a server running a Server Core installation of Windows Server 2008 R2: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee441253(WS.10).aspx

RsyncServer Service does not start on a Windows Server 2003

Today I got a error message from our monitoring that Rsync Service on one of our server doesn’t run. Reinstalling the service does not solve the problem. I could start the service but after some seconds the service stopped again.

The Event Log shows the following information:

==============================
Event Type: Information
Event Source: RsyncServer
Event Category: None
Event ID: 0
Date: 22.12.2009
Time: 08:30:52
User: WEB-WIN-xxx-xxx\SvcCWRSYNC
Computer: WEB-WIN-xxx-xxx
Description:
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( RsyncServer ) cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and Support for details. The following information is part of the event: RsyncServer: PID 1856: `RsyncServer’ service stopped, exit status: 11.
==============================
There is a pretty easy solution for this problem:
  • Delete the .pid file in the cwrsync directory (in our case this is: C:\Program Files\ICW)
  • now start the service