travis' brain dump

Now, when I say “pesky annoyance” I mean down right frustrating. Say your thumbnails won’t work on your xbox 360 when viewing items thrown out over media sharing and you’ve got this wonderful errors blasting around your event log:

Log Name:      System
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-DistributedCOM
Event ID:      10016
Description:
The machine-default permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID
{AB8902B4-09CA-4BB6-B78D-A8F59079A8D5}
 to the user NT AUTHORITY\NETWORK SERVICE SID (S-1-5-20) from address LocalHost (Using LRPC). This security permission can be modified using the Component Services administrative tool.

Now, just think about how tech-savvy you really are. You know what’s up. You’re going to go find out what application this is by finding the AppID in the registry then head over to Component Services and go fix this up, right? You start “dcomcnfg” and you browse over to “Thumbnail Cache Out of Proc Server” and try to modify it… no love. Greyed out options and all you’ve just been denied by your trusty operating system. You know you’re and administrator but behold, you’ve been given the finger by Windows.

No worries.

Someone, somewhere decided that they would make a security consideration here and grant only “Trustedinstaller” full control permission instead of Administrators. How dare they huh? To fix this up, do the following:

    1. Open Registry Editor and browse over to ‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\CLASSES\AppID\{AB8902B4-09CA-4BB6-B78D-A8F59079A8D5}’
    2. Right click on the {AB8902B4-09CA-4BB6-B78D-A8F59079A8D5} key and choose “Permissions…”
    3. Just as you would a file, take ownership and assign it to ‘Administrators’ then go back and grant ‘Administrators’ the ‘full control’ permission.
    4. Restart dcomcnfg and modify away.

Once you’ve made your modifications and granted Local Activation permissions to NETWORK SERVICE, you should eliminate those errors.

This trick can be applied to ANY CLISD you can’t modify in Component Services DCOM Configuration. 🙂

Ok, so since my post a couple days ago I’ve been doing a lot of research and such.

The big kicker that got me on this whole thing was the the installation worked fine on my x32 VISTA but not on my x64 VISTA installation inside the same domain but yet replicated the same behavior on my x64 Windows 7 system as well. I think it led me down a winding road in the opposite direction to be honest.

So, today I decided I would give this another shot. I needed to figure this out. I don’t do well with problems that I haven’t resolved and usually need to find some way to fix them. So, in doing so, I loaded up x64 in a virtual setup and decided to go to town on it. This time I didn’t install it to the domain but left it in a workgroup. Lo and behold, the 360 went right in. The irritating thing here was that since it worked on my 32bit but not on my 64bit while being in the same domain, subject to the same GPO I dismissed GPO as being the culprit (as you can read in my previous post). This was premature of me and now I’m kicking myself.

So, now that I’ve officially ruled out that it was an issue with x64, what’s the next step to make sure I can get this to work in my normal installation. Here’s what I did:

1) Uninstalled the MCE from Windows MC and Uninstalled software from the XBOX 360. (Xbox Article on Removal)
2) Made sure the user MCX1 was deleted and that I cleared out the certificiates. (Microsoft Article on Removal)
3) Disjoined my Windows box from the domain and rebooted.
4) Created a new Computer OU in my AD tree and made sure to block inheritance on group policy objects as well as ensure there were no links to the default domain policy in place. This makes sure that no GPO properties are applied to the computers located in this container.
5) Logged in with a local Administrator account on the Windows box and rejoined it to the domain. (don’t reboot)
6) Once the computer was registered it now shows up in AD in the “Computers” OU. If you had it in a custom OU prior to this, check that OU since AD is pretty smart and will sometimes put things back where they were. Move the computer to the blocked OU and now reboot it.
7) Upon reboot, login as the local administrator and run your MCE setup again. It should work fine this time.
8) Logout and log back in as your regular user. Your account profile settings should be just fine. Since your SID never changed from the domain, it will match you right back up where you need to be and your preferences and such should still be fine. If you’re paranoid about this, feel free to back up your profile prior to playing with this.

Currently, I’m logged in as my normal user account and everything seems to be fine. I had to go back in and clean up some of my media sharing directories that I was watching and repoint the MCE to the right media folders to watch but that was it. Everything is working great now.

My only guess is that perhaps when I deployed a 2008 server out into the dc structure and extended the schema it added something out there that my 32bit machine didn’t pick up on. I don’t know. If I get bored one day, maybe I will pick this apart and find out the exact GPO settings that are causing this issue. Until then, this is a perfectly acceptable way to resolve this in a home environment.

If you have any questions, let me know. I’ll fill in the blanks if there is anything that is unclear.

Now, I’ve seen that there have been a couple of posts up on the internet concerning this issue and it’s frustrating to find that there is no solid answers out there. Hopefully we can get something moving from this thread.

Recently I decided to move from Vista x32 to Vista x64 due to memory upgrade limitations. Upon loading up Vista x64 I discovered that while my media sharing worked just fine I was unable to setup my 360 to be an MCE.

Upon researching all of the solutions posted out there and trying them all, I decided to do some controlled tests to see if I could replicate the issue. EACH series was conducted on FRESHLY loaded installations of Vista Ultimate and here’s the results.

Setup parameters

MCE: Xbox 360 Elite Edition
MCPC: Intel based Core 2 Duo System with 4GB RAM @ 3.00Ghz (DP35DP)

The base connectivity is a 3COM unmanaged 10/100 switch connected into a Cisco ASA 5505 which is bridged to QWEST DSL via a Cisco 678 DSL modem. All drops in the residence have been checked for interference and signal quality, all passing with flying colors.

A Server 2008 based Active Directory Domain is present in this configuration with GPO enforced to the Computers via a link to the OU that contains all PC’s. There is also an Exchange 2007 server present in this configuration.

When each test is completed, the XBOX is wiped to factory defaults to ensure a fresh approach.
——————————————————————————-

Both instances of Vista Ultimate were setup and the latests updates applied. For all intent and purpose, these systems are 100% identical with the exception of the platform they are operating on. (x32 & x64)

No other software has been installed.
Driver versions are as close in version as possible given the environment.
Identical GPO information exists and is confirmed via a painstaking review.
GPO settings consist of only disabling Windows Firewall, enabling Remote Desktop and allowing Media Center to launch.
All installations are conducted via the local machine Administrator account.

——————————————————————————-
The x32 instance boots up, Media Center is run, skipping the inital configuration and going directly to the main menu. The Xbox 360 is powered up and Media Center immediately recognizes it’s existence and questions wether to install it or not. Choosing the option to do so, it prompts for the 8-digit code and waits. On the XBOX setup is initialized and upon posting the 8-digit code is left to stand.

The 8-digit code is entered and setup continues making only one prompt for user input to allow access to media. A few moments later, Media Center appears on the MCE and is fully operational.

——————————————————————————-
The x64 instance boots up, Media Center is run, skipping the initial configuration and going directly to the main menu. The Xbox 360 is powered up and Media Center immediately recognizes it’s existence and questions wether to install it or not.
Choosing the option to do so, it prompts for the 8-digit code and waits. On the XBOX setup is initialized and upon posting the 8-digit code is left to stand.

The 8-digit code is entered and setup continues making only one prompt for user input to allow access to media. A few moments later, a screen pops up on the XBOX 360 and states:

Connection Failed
The Xbox 360 was unable to prepare a connection to the Windows Vista Media Center-based PC. Restart your Xbox 360 and try again.

On the Vista system, the following screen holds a pattern:

This screen sits for a few minutes then states the the setup has been completed despite the fact the Xbox has not contacted the Media Center then states the system is configured. Any attempt to reconnect the MCE to the MCP results in the same message on the XBOX as posted before.

Upon reviewing the logs the following is reported:

(SYSTEM)

Information 1/19/2009 5:29:03 PM Microsoft-Windows-HttpEvent 15008 None Reservation for namespace identified by URL prefix http://+:10244/McxDMS/Mcx1/ was successfully deleted.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:02 PM Microsoft-Windows-User-PnP 20001 None Driver Management concluded the process to install driver FileRepository\mcx2.inf_fa4c2e08\mcx2.inf for Device Instance ID UUID:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA\UMB\3&2883BB&6&UUID:20000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA with the following status: 0.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:02 PM Microsoft-Windows-User-PnP 20003 None Driver Management has concluded the process to add Service UMPass for Device Instance ID UUID:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA\UMB\3&2883BB&6&UUID:20000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA with the following status: 0.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1003 None The child network device uuid:20000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-User-PnP 20001 None Driver Management concluded the process to install driver FileRepository\umbus.inf_58c4d6d8\umbus.inf for Device Instance ID IPBUSENUMROOT\UMB\2&BA1FFA4&0&UUID:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA with the following status: 0.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-User-PnP 20003 None Driver Management has concluded the process to add Service umbus for Device Instance ID IPBUSENUMROOT\UMB\2&BA1FFA4&0&UUID:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA with the following status: 0.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1002 None The parent network device uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1000 None The network device Provider\Microsoft.Networking.SSDP//uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:01 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1000 None The network device Provider\Microsoft.Networking.SSDP//uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:04 PM Service Control Manager 7036 None The CNG Key Isolation service entered the running state.
Information 1/19/2009 5:28:58 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1000 None The network device Provider\Microsoft.Networking.SSDP//uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.
Information 1/19/2009 5:28:52 PM Microsoft-Windows-IPBusEnum 1000 None The network device Provider\Microsoft.Networking.SSDP//uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA was successfully added to this computer.

MEDIA CENTER

Information 1/19/2009 5:29:03 PM Mcx2Prov 506 None Windows Media Center Extender account Mcx1 has been created for device ‘uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA’.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:03 PM Mcx2Prov 504 None Windows Media Center Extender setup has exchanged certificates with device ‘uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA’.
Information 1/19/2009 5:29:02 PM Mcx2Prov 500 None Windows Media Center Extender Xbox 360 Media Center Extender ‘uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA’ discovered at address 10.0.1.25.
Information 1/19/2009 5:28:54 PM Mcx2Svc 300 None Windows Media Center Extender software was sent to device ‘uuid:10000000-0000-0000-0200-001DD85922DA’. Software version 0x20594c00.
Information 1/19/2009 5:28:51 PM Mcx2Dvcs 400 None Windows Media Center Extender setup successfully configured the Windows Media Center PC for use with an Extender.
Information 1/19/2009 5:28:51 PM Mcx2Prov 501 None Administrator started Windows Media Center Extender setup with the following options: Firewall settings (0,0,1,1) Power management (0) Media settings (1)

Zero errors are reported on the MCP side, yet the XBOX flat refuses to connect to this instance. The certificates are also correctly issued and the MCX1 account is successfully created and shows in the User list.

——————————————————————————-

So far I can only conclude there is something going on with the x64 installation as two seperate attempts to reproduce this error were successful. It should also be noted that the same tests were conducted with Vista not joined to the domain *AND* the latest Windows 7 beta and produced EXACTLY the same result.

So, it’s been a while since I’ve stroked some ego’s over at Exagrid in a blog post so here comes one and it’s more than due. First off, those who have read the posts and reached David Lyne or as we’ll call him from here on out “The Dave”, thanks for passing along that you got info from my site. It makes me feel like it’s worth writing these posts and people actually read them. 🙂

So… onto the expansion of self-image and speaking of “The Dave”. We had received three units for other locations in the company and upon setting them up we discovered a completely new look courtesy of the latest version update that included an overhaul of the GUI. Two words “F`n Sweet”. Everything I want to know about my sites in a nice summary snapshot with the ability to drill down into reports on anything I could think of at the touch of my fingers.  The only thing lacking? Our three units previously installed had no love.

One quick call over and David was on it. Updated completely on all systems in less than an hour. The product has come a long way even in the short time we’ve been using them.  I truly have enjoyed being able to check on information about specific deduplication jobs while they are occurring and seeing how they are faring. Not to mention being able to summarize all jobs based on the share and find out how it’s handling new additions to the backups.

So it’s not the clearest screenshot due to size constraints in this post, but the visuals are not the only reason why we’re ordering more. LOL  Our average de-duplication is still rocking along. I’m able to retrieve data back to June and we’re still clearing 11.67:1 in the whole site. Our biggest backup portion is at 13.63:1 that totals 41,135.6GB down into 3,018.84 GB. How’s that for some fun? Even better is the SQL backups. 18.66:1 (1,446.6 GB collapsed into 77.53 GB)

This build also seems much more stable than it’s predecessors and has been running quite well since we upgraded a few weeks ago. I’m really impressed with how things have been improving. Only one more site to go and we’ll be fully deployed. Ahhh… to be able to sleep at night. 🙂

All in all I have to give those guys out there at Exagrid a pat on the back for a job well done. Both in development *AND* support. 

As always, if anyone has questions, feel free to send them my way. I will hopefully get some time in the next few weeks to finish up a little white paper on optimizing bandwidth utilization using EX5000’s with Commvault.

Back to the grinding wheel! 🙂