System Center Advisor Release Notes
These release notes apply to System Center Advisor and contain the most detailed information about any known issues that you might experience. You can also find additional information in the online help.
The following topics are addressed in these release notes:
Support information
Deploying Advisor
Upgrading a previous version
General Advisor usage
Uninstalling or changing Advisor
Support information
The following sections describe important support information for Advisor.
Advisor does not support IDN
The current version of Advisor does not support the use of internationalized domain names (IDN). This is due to a limitation with the .NET Framework 3.5.
Deploying Advisor
The following issues might occur during the deployment of the on-premise software for Advisor.
You cannot download the registration certificate
When you attempt to download the registration certificate, the download might fail with the following error message:
“Unable to open this Internet site. The requested site is either unavailable or cannot be found. Please try again later.”
This is a known issue with Internet Explorer that occurs when the Do not save encrypted pages to disk option is selected in Internet Explorer. To resolve this issue, do the following:
In Internet Explorer, click Tools, and then click Internet Options.
Click the Advanced tab, and then scroll down to the Security section.
Clear Do not save encrypted pages to disk, and then click OK.
Do not install an Advisor gateway on a domain controller
For the best results, do not install the Advisor gateway on a computer that is also a domain controller.
You see an error during the installation of the System Center Operations Manager agent on a domain controller
If you are installing the Advisor agent on a domain controller, you might see the following error message when the System Center Operations Manager agent is installed:
“Warning 25362. Failed to start HealthService service. Setup will proceed, please examine your eventlog.”
You can ignore this message. The Health Service will be started automatically after you finish installing the Advisor agent.
You cannot use an agent that was previously removed
If you have installed an agent and then remove it through the Servers page, that agent will continue to collect data and send it to the gateway; however data from that agent can no longer be uploaded from the gateway to Advisor.
Uninstalling and simply reinstalling the agent does not solve the problem.
To fix this issue, after you remove the agent on the Servers page, if you later decide to continue to use this agent, you need to do the following:
Uninstall the on-premise software from the computer.
Delete the associated agent folder on the gateway. Agent folders are located by default in c:\Program Files\System Center Advisor\GatewayData\Mailboxes. Agent folders are listed by the agent GUID.
To identify the specific agent folder to delete, on the computer where the agent was installed, open the Registry Editor and view the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SystemCenterAdvisor registry entry. Locate the agent ID. Find the folder on the gateway that corresponds to this ID, and then delete it.
Reinstall the on-premise software.
The Advisor agent version 1.1 and later requires PowerShell 2.0
The latest version of the Advisor agent requires that PowerShell 2.0 is enabled on the computer where the agent is installed. For details on how to enable PowerShell 2.0, see PowerShell 2.0 Is Not Present.
Clustering support
The Advisor agent is supported on computers running Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 and configured to be part of a Windows failover cluster. You can view the clusters in the Advisor portal, the same as physical computers. The only difference is seen on the Servers page, where clusters are identified as TYPE=CLUSTER (as opposed to TYPE=AGENT, the way that physical computers are identified).
The discovery and configuration rules will run on the active and passive nodes of the cluster, but any alerts generated on the passive nodes will be ignored. If a node shifts from passive to active, alerts for that node are displayed automatically, with no intervention required from you.
Some alerts might be generated twice, depending on the rule that generates the alert. For example, a rule that detects a bad driver by examining the operating system entity will generate alerts for both the physical server and the cluster.
Configuration analysis of passive nodes is not supported.
In addition, the Advisor portal does not support grouping or linking of Windows Server computers that are part of the same Windows failover cluster.
Upgrading a previous version
The following issues might occur during or after upgrading from a previous version of the product.
Order for upgrade
In general, you should upgrade your gateway first and then any agents. See Upgrade from a Previous Version of System Center Advisor for information.
The CreateDate for your database is shown as updated despite no changes
After you upgrade your agent to the V1 version, when you view change history information in the Advisor portal, the CreateDate configuration parameter for your databases is listed as having changed; however, the date listed in the Current Value is 8 hours prior to the date listed in the Previous Value column. This is related to the changes made to the agent and can be disregarded. The date shown in the Previous Value column accurately reflects the last change made to your database.
General Advisor usage
The following issues might occur when you use Advisor.
An error might occur when you add numerous servers or numerous management packs
An error can occur when you add numerous servers under the Advisor Managed group or when you import numerous management packs. The error will resemble Could not allocate space for object ‘dbo.EntityTransactionLog’.’PK_EntityTransactionLog’ in database ‘OperationsManager’ because the ‘PRIMARY’ filegroup is full. Create disk space by deleting unneeded files, dropping objects in the filegroup, adding additional files to the filegroup, or setting autogrowth on for existing files in the filegroup. The cause of the error results from the SQL database running out of space to add more objects and it prevents Operations Manager and Advisor from adding any additional objects.
To correct this issue, we recommend that you increase the default database size.
Lync Server and the MonitoringHost.exe
After you deploy the Advisor agent to your Lync server, you may see an increase in the amount of private bytes used by the MonitoringHost.exe program.
To correct this issue, increase the Monitoring Host Threshold:
In the Operations Manager Operations console, open Authoring.
Click Scope on the toolbar. If a scope was previously enabled, click Scope twice to clear the previous scope.
In the Look for box, type Agent.
Select the box for the Agent target, and then click OK.
In Monitors, expand Agent, Entity Health, Performance, Health Service Performance, and then Health Service State.
Under Health Service State, right-click Monitoring Handle Count Threshold, and then click Overrides -> Override the Monitor -> For a group.
In the Select Object box, select Management Server Computer Group, and then click OK.
In the Override Properties box, select Agent Performance Monitor Type - Threshold, change the Override Setting for this parameter from 2000 to 7500, and then click OK.
Under Health Service State, right-click Monitoring Host Private Bytes, and then click Overrides -> Override the Monitor -> For a group.
In the Override Properties box, select Agent Performance Monitor Type – Threshold, change the Override Setting from 104857600 to 629145600, and then click OK.
Repeat steps 7 through 10 for the Agent Managed Computer Group.
Advisor agent stops working
The Advisor agent might stop working. If this occurs, you’ll notice that the System Center Health Service does not respond and consumes a significant amount of memory (greater than 1GB). You also might not be able to stop the Health Service.
This issue is addressed in System Center Advisor Update Rollup 1, which will be released through Microsoft Update at the end of May, 2012.
To work around this issue before the update is available, do the following:
Restart the System Center Health Service.
If you cannot restart the service, end the process (HealthService) and then restart it.
Repeat these steps every 2-3 weeks or when the Health Service uses an abnormal amount of memory.
Advisor and SQL Server 2012
The Advisor health service runs under the Local System account. In SQL Server versions up to 2008 R2, the Local System account was enabled as a login by default and was a member of the sysadmin server role. Starting with SQL 2012, the Local System login is not part of the sysadmin server role anymore. As a result when you install Advisor, it will not be able to monitor the SQL 2012 instance completely and not all rules can generate alerts.
In order for Advisor to discover and generate alerts for the SQL 2012 instance, you need to run the following script in the SQL Server. You need to be logged in as a sysadmin in order for this script to work.
USE [master]
GO
/****** Add a login in SQL Server for the service SID of System Center Advisor HealthService ******/
CREATE LOGIN [NT SERVICE\HealthService] FROM WINDOWS WITH DEFAULT_DATABASE=[master], DEFAULT_LANGUAGE=[us_english]
GO
/****** Add the HealthService Service SID login to the sysadmin server role ******/
ALTER SERVER ROLE [sysadmin] ADD MEMBER [NT SERVICE\HealthService]
GO
Advisor stops working after you upgrade to System Center 2012 - Operations Manager
If you are using the 1.0 version of Advisor in an environment with Operations Manager 2007 R2, and you upgrade your agent to the System Center 2012 – Operations Manager version, or if you are using Advisor and install Operations Manager 2012 for the first time, the Advisor agent will cease to function.
You might see, in the portal, that data uploads from the gateway have stalled. You will also get an error, EventID 2000, logged in the Event Viewer.
System Center 2012 Operations Manager requires the 1.1 version of the Advisor agent. See Upgrade from a Previous Version of System Center Advisor for more information.
System Center Operation Manager Health Service keeps restarting
If you have an agent that is multi-homed with System Center Operations Manager 2007 R2, the Health Service might repeatedly restart. You might also see the following error in the event log:
LaunchRestartHealthService.js : Launching Restart Health Service. Health Service exceeded Process\Handle Count or Private Bytes threshhold.
To correct this issue, increase the Health Service Handle Count Threshold:
In the Operations Manager Operations console, open Authoring.
Click Scope on the toolbar. If a scope was previously enabled, click Scope twice to clear the previous scope.
In the Look for box, type health service.
Select the box for the Health Service target, and then click OK.
In Monitors, expand Health Service, Entity Health, Performance, and then Health Service Performance.
Under Health Service Performance, right-click Health Service Handle Count Threshold, and then click Overrides -> Override the Monitor -> For a group.
In the Select Object box, select Management Server Computer Group, and then click OK.
In the Override Properties box, select Agent Performance Monitor Type - Threshold, change the Override Setting for this parameter from 2000 to 6500, and then click OK.
Under Health Service Performance, right-click Health Service Private Bytes Threshold, and then click Overrides -> Override the Monitor -> For a group.
In the Override Properties box, select Agent Performance Monitor Type – Threshold, change the Override Setting from 104857600 to 629145600, and then click OK.
Repeat steps 7 through 10 for the Agent Managed Computer Group.
Operations Manager warning events
You might see warning events for the AdvisorMonitor management group in the Operations Manager event log on the servers where you installed Advisor on-premise software.
In Advisor, the Operations Manager management server has been replaced by the Advisor cloud infrastructure. Because of this, the Health Service communication discovery, which is intended to discover communication between the System Center agent and the management server, will fail. This is expected and does not impact Advisor – you can ignore these warnings. These warnings will also not impact System Center Operations Manager, if your Advisor agent is multi-homed, as long as the warnings are logged against the AdvisorMonitor management group.
Examples of the events:
Source: Health Service Modules
Date: 10/13/2010 10:11:22 AM
Event ID: 21405
Task Category: None
Level: Warning
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: contoso.com
Description: The process started at 10:11:22 AM failed to create System.Discovery.Data, no errors detected in the output. The process exited with 1
Command executed: "C:\Windows\system32\cscript.exe" /nologo "DiscoverHealthServiceCommunicationRelationships.js" 0 {3237253B-2A1C-38E7-8E52-588635224D35} {80B969D5-F0FF-93F8-2CFA-AB68B70825CB} contoso.com "AdvisorMonitor"
Working Directory: C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\Health Service State\Monitoring Host Temporary Files 2\80\
Source: Health Service Script
Date: 10/13/2010 10:11:22 AM
Event ID: 6028
Task Category: None
Level: Warning
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: contoso.com
Description:
DiscoverHealthServiceCommunicationRelationships.js : HealthServiceCommuncation relationship discovery for HealthServices configured via AD Integration
Could not find "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Microsoft Operations Manager\3.0\Agent Management Groups\AdvisorMonitor\AD Cache\Primary SCP Info\Service DNS Name"
The HealthService needs at least a primary management server to communicate.
Source: Health Service Modules
Generating Rule: Collect Service Check Probe Module Events
Event Number: 11773
Level: Warning
Logging Computer: contoso.com
User: N/A
Description: Error getting state of service
Error: 0x8007007b
Details: The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect.
One or more workflows were affected by this.
Source: Health Service Modules
Generating Rule: Collect Batch Response Module Events
Event Number: 21406
Level: Warning
Logging Computer: contoso.com
User: N/A
Description: The process started at 12:20:11 PM failed to create System.PropertyBagData.
Errors found in output:
C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\Health Service State\Monitoring Host Temporary Files 7\2\GetSQL2008DBSpace.js(67, 12) Microsoft JScript runtime error: 'Databases' is null or not an object
Command executed: "C:\Windows\system32\cscript.exe" /nologo "GetSQL2008DBSpace.js" CONTOSO
Working Directory: C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\Health Service State\Monitoring Host Temporary Files 7\2\
One or more workflows were affected by this.
Numerous data uploads per day, despite configuration
You might experience a situation where the Advisor agent and gateway repeatedly upload data to Advisor, despite being configured to send uploads no more than twice per day. This can occur in environments with both Advisor and System Center Operations Manager. The issue is caused by an outdated Operations Manager management pack.
To fix this issue, use the latest Operations Manager 2007 R2 management pack. You can download the new management pack at https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=205411.
Uninstalling or changing Advisor
The following issues might occur when you uninstall the on-premise software for Advisor.
The Health Service stops and does not restart during a canceled uninstallation or repair
If you cancel the Advisor setup during uninstallation or repair, you will need to manually restart the Health Service.
To restart the Health Service, open the Services console (services.msc), right-click System Center Management, and then click Restart.
You receive an error that the agent cannot be unregistered from the gateway
When you uninstall an agent, you might see the following error message:
“An error occurred while attempting to unregister Advisor agent from the gateway.”
You can ignore this error.