Control the order of service startup

[pimy]

Hi,

A couple of my servers are generating the following error intermittently:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Category: None
Event ID: 7000
Date: 9/11/2007
Time: 3:02:55 AM
User: N/A
Computer: ServerA
Description:
The Blah1 service failed to start due to the following error:
The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is invalid
for the account name

specified.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Category: None
Event ID: 7000
Date: 9/11/2007
Time: 3:02:55 AM
User: N/A
Computer: ServerA
Description:
The Blah2 service failed to start due to the following error:
The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is invalid
for the account name

specified.

Both Blah1 & Blah2 are custom services that use the same domain account.
I know that the account name and password are valid. We reboot each of
these servers nightly. The error has occurred 3 times in the past 2 weeks.
I suspect that another service (a third-party service), let's call it Blah3,
may be the culprit. I noticed that each time the error occurred, Blah3
had started before Blah1 or Blah2 reported being unable to start. Mind you,
I am unable to know for certain that Blah1 & Blah2 started before Blah3
when the server did not generate an error because their startup time is not
logged.

I've experimented a little with the
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ServiceGroupOrder
registry key on a different server. I've assigned 2 different third-party
services (blah4 & blah5)

to 2 different service groups on a different server. Doing so seems to
produce the behavior I want.

For example, I assign blah4 to the PCI Configuration service group, and
blah5 to the MS Transactions

service group. After a reboot, I see that the blah4 started before blah5,
which is what I expected

to happen. However, when I reverse the groupings, both services started at
the same time. Mind you,

that may be because blah5 is a lightweight service and doesn't take very
long to start.

Going back to Blah1, Blah2, and Blah3, is there an easier way to control the
order in which the

services start? Any advice on the service groups I should be using? Any
danger in creating new

custom service groups? Any way to put delays in between service groups?

Thanks,
pimy

 

[Meinolf Weber]

Re: Control the order of service startup

Hello pimy,

Check out this one:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314357

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers
no rights.

> Hi,
>
> A couple of my servers are generating the following error
> intermittently:
>
> Event Type: Error
> Event Source: Service Control Manager
> Event Category: None
> Event ID: 7000
> Date: 9/11/2007
> Time: 3:02:55 AM
> User: N/A
> Computer: ServerA
> Description:
> The Blah1 service failed to start due to the following error:
> The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is
> invalid
> for the account name
> specified.
>
> Event Type: Error
> Event Source: Service Control Manager
> Event Category: None
> Event ID: 7000
> Date: 9/11/2007
> Time: 3:02:55 AM
> User: N/A
> Computer: ServerA
> Description:
> The Blah2 service failed to start due to the following error:
> The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is
> invalid
> for the account name
> specified.
>
> Both Blah1 & Blah2 are custom services that use the same domain
> account. I know that the account name and password are valid. We
> reboot each of these servers nightly. The error has occurred 3 times
> in the past 2 weeks. I suspect that another service (a third-party
> service), let's call it Blah3, may be the culprit. I noticed that each
> time the error occurred, Blah3 had started before Blah1 or Blah2
> reported being unable to start. Mind you, I am unable to know for
> certain that Blah1 & Blah2 started before Blah3 when the server did
> not generate an error because their startup time is not logged.
>
> I've experimented a little with the
> HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ServiceGroupOrder registry key
> on a different server. I've assigned 2 different third-party services
> (blah4 & blah5)
>
> to 2 different service groups on a different server. Doing so seems
> to produce the behavior I want.
>
> For example, I assign blah4 to the PCI Configuration service group,
> and blah5 to the MS Transactions
>
> service group. After a reboot, I see that the blah4 started before
> blah5, which is what I expected
>
> to happen. However, when I reverse the groupings, both services
> started at the same time. Mind you,
>
> that may be because blah5 is a lightweight service and doesn't take
> very long to start.
>
> Going back to Blah1, Blah2, and Blah3, is there an easier way to
> control the order in which the
>
> services start? Any advice on the service groups I should be using?
> Any danger in creating new
>
> custom service groups? Any way to put delays in between service
> groups?
>
> Thanks,
> pimy

 

[pimy]

Re: Control the order of service startup

Hi, and thanks for the reply.

Unfortunately that KB article doesn't help because
(a) I am able to successfully start the services manually after the error
occurs
(b) the account is on local admin on that server, I checked, definitely has
sufficient rights
(c) the error does not occur every time the server is restarted
(d) the account credentials have not been changed in AD or in those services
for many weeks
(e) when the error occurs there are no entries for the account used to start
those services in the Security log, whereas when the services start
successfully there are entries.

As I said in my earlier post, I think the error is misleading.

Thanks,
pimy

"Meinolf Weber" wrote:

> Hello pimy,
>
> Check out this one:
> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314357
>
> Best regards
>
> Meinolf Weber
> Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers
> no rights.
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > A couple of my servers are generating the following error
> > intermittently:
> >
> > Event Type: Error
> > Event Source: Service Control Manager
> > Event Category: None
> > Event ID: 7000
> > Date: 9/11/2007
> > Time: 3:02:55 AM
> > User: N/A
> > Computer: ServerA
> > Description:
> > The Blah1 service failed to start due to the following error:
> > The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is
> > invalid
> > for the account name
> > specified.
> >
> > Event Type: Error
> > Event Source: Service Control Manager
> > Event Category: None
> > Event ID: 7000
> > Date: 9/11/2007
> > Time: 3:02:55 AM
> > User: N/A
> > Computer: ServerA
> > Description:
> > The Blah2 service failed to start due to the following error:
> > The account name is invalid or does not exist, or the password is
> > invalid
> > for the account name
> > specified.
> >
> > Both Blah1 & Blah2 are custom services that use the same domain
> > account. I know that the account name and password are valid. We
> > reboot each of these servers nightly. The error has occurred 3 times
> > in the past 2 weeks. I suspect that another service (a third-party
> > service), let's call it Blah3, may be the culprit. I noticed that each
> > time the error occurred, Blah3 had started before Blah1 or Blah2
> > reported being unable to start. Mind you, I am unable to know for
> > certain that Blah1 & Blah2 started before Blah3 when the server did
> > not generate an error because their startup time is not logged.
> >
> > I've experimented a little with the
> > HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ServiceGroupOrder registry key
> > on a different server. I've assigned 2 different third-party services
> > (blah4 & blah5)
> >
> > to 2 different service groups on a different server. Doing so seems
> > to produce the behavior I want.
> >
> > For example, I assign blah4 to the PCI Configuration service group,
> > and blah5 to the MS Transactions
> >
> > service group. After a reboot, I see that the blah4 started before
> > blah5, which is what I expected
> >
> > to happen. However, when I reverse the groupings, both services
> > started at the same time. Mind you,
> >
> > that may be because blah5 is a lightweight service and doesn't take
> > very long to start.
> >
> > Going back to Blah1, Blah2, and Blah3, is there an easier way to
> > control the order in which the
> >
> > services start? Any advice on the service groups I should be using?
> > Any danger in creating new
> >
> > custom service groups? Any way to put delays in between service
> > groups?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > pimy
>
>
>