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Troubleshooting Emergency Management Services

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Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, Windows Server 2003 with SP2

 

Troubleshooting Emergency Management Services

Important

  • You can use the approaches provided in this topic to troubleshoot Emergency Management Services components, not to troubleshoot your system. For information about using Emergency Management Services to troubleshoot your system, see Emergency Management Services How To....

What problem are you having?

  • The out-of-band port is briefly unavailable; no status information appears.

  • Status information appears, but Emergency Management Services does not respond to terminal input.

  • The kernel debugger disables !Special Administration Console (!SAC). Garbled characters might appear.

The out-of-band port is briefly unavailable; no status information appears.

Cause: The Windows Server 2003 family components that provide Emergency Management Services load and unload as part of the startup process, which causes components to become briefly disabled. This is called a "black-out period."

Solution: If Special Administration Console (SAC) or !Special Administration Console (!SAC) do not respond, wait for operating system components to initialize before restarting or stopping the system using whatever means are available, such as a service processor or uninterruptible power supply (UPS). If a service processor is present, consult your documentation to determine other diagnostic tools that it provides.

See also:Using Emergency Management Services.

Status information appears, but Emergency Management Services does not respond to terminal input.

Cause: The Windows Server 2003 family components that provide Emergency Management Services load and unload as part of the startup process, which causes components to provide limited functionality. This is called a "gray-out period."

Solution: Gray-out periods might become interactive if the component provides !Special Administration Console (!SAC) functionality. If !SAC does not respond, however, wait for operating system components to initialize before restarting or stopping the system using other means, such as a service processor or uninterruptible power supply (UPS). If a service processor is present, consult your documentation to determine other diagnostic tools that it provides.

See also:!Special Administration Console (!SAC) and !SAC commands.

The kernel debugger disables !Special Administration Console (!SAC). Garbled characters might appear.

Cause: The kernel debugger and !SAC cannot use the same serial port simultaneously. In addition, when a kernel debugger is running, !SAC becomes unavailable because the debugger takes control of the system if a Stop error occurs.

Solution: Use different serial ports for the kernel debugger and !SAC. It is important to specify the correct COMx parameters in the Boot.ini file. You should also disable kernel debuggers on servers during normal operations.