"Checking Your Credentials" Error

[Chris Thomas]

I am running Citrix MetaFrame Presentation Server 4.5 on a Windows 2003
Standard Edition Server SP2 with Terminal Services. The server is an HP
Proliant DL320 G5 with 3 GB of RAM and a Dual Core Xeon 2.66 GHz processor.
We do not publish applications on our Citrix server just a desktop. All
users use the Citrix Program Neighborhood client, version 10.100.55836. We
are experiencing a problem with this server that has been going on for nearly
a year now and we could really use some help.

The problem starts when a user calls the Help Desk and tells us that they
can't get into Citrix. We then attempt to connect as well as get the same
problem. You put in your user name and password, hit enter then you get
stuck at a message that says, "Checking Your Credentials". Anyone, no matter
if they are domain admin or regular user, receives the same message when they
log on. If we go to the server console and log on, we do not see that
message. We only see a blank gray desktop, with no icons and no mouse
pointer. Oddly enough, the users that were already logged on to the server
are able to kep working and not notice any issue. We have waited up to an
hour for something to happen at this point, but we eventually have to power
off the server with the power button and start it back up. Sometimes we can
go a couple of weeks without this happening and sometimes it'll happen a
couple times in one day. Once this problem starts, even using RDP to connect
to the server produces a blank desktop. It's not so bad if it happens
during the workday, but trips in to work on the weekend to reboot the server
are getting old.

There is nothing in my server logs that have provided any information about
the problem aside from the constant barrage of printer driver errors that
seem to happen on all Citrix servers. I have been watching the security logs
to see if the problem happens when any particular user logs on, but I have
not been able to see a pattern. We also replaced the older server that was
experiencing this same exact problem, with this new one. We didn't use an
image or anything so we were very surprised when it happened again.

I opened a ticket with Citrix about this problem but after trying a few
things that had no effect, they have concluded that it's a Windows/Active
Directory issue and have wished me luck. They recommended that I monitor
running processes on the server and when the lockups occur, I should check to
see if the handle count of any single process is more than 10,000. This
would then identify the problem. A day later when the server locked up
again, no process was using more than around 2,000 handles so it appears that
this is not our problem. I did notice that there was one particular process,
Outlook.exe, that belonged to our CEO. This was odd since he was not logged
on at the time. I tried to end the process manually but I was told Access
Denied. Two other users were also logged on at the time and they seemed to
be working OK, although the server would not accept any new connections.

I have seen several people all around the interwebs experiencing this
problem, but so far no solutions have been found for my issue. If anyone has
some information that might help me get this resolved, I would definitely
appreciate it. Thanks much. ---Chris

 

[Chris Thomas]

RE: "Checking Your Credentials" Error

The lockup happened again last night and when I went to the server, I found
the same condition as last time. There were only 2 users loged on at the
time, but there was an outlook.exe process still listed that belonged to a
user that had logged off a few minutes earlier (A different user than
before). Again, I received "Access Denied" when I tried to kill the process.

Not sure why this single outlook.exe process is hanging like this. Should I
be posting this in the Outlook/Office group?

Thanks


"Chris Thomas" wrote:

> I am running Citrix MetaFrame Presentation Server 4.5 on a Windows 2003
> Standard Edition Server SP2 with Terminal Services. The server is an HP
> Proliant DL320 G5 with 3 GB of RAM and a Dual Core Xeon 2.66 GHz processor.
> We do not publish applications on our Citrix server just a desktop. All
> users use the Citrix Program Neighborhood client, version 10.100.55836. We
> are experiencing a problem with this server that has been going on for nearly
> a year now and we could really use some help.
>
> The problem starts when a user calls the Help Desk and tells us that they
> can't get into Citrix. We then attempt to connect as well as get the same
> problem. You put in your user name and password, hit enter then you get
> stuck at a message that says, "Checking Your Credentials". Anyone, no matter
> if they are domain admin or regular user, receives the same message when they
> log on. If we go to the server console and log on, we do not see that
> message. We only see a blank gray desktop, with no icons and no mouse
> pointer. Oddly enough, the users that were already logged on to the server
> are able to kep working and not notice any issue. We have waited up to an
> hour for something to happen at this point, but we eventually have to power
> off the server with the power button and start it back up. Sometimes we can
> go a couple of weeks without this happening and sometimes it'll happen a
> couple times in one day. Once this problem starts, even using RDP to connect
> to the server produces a blank desktop. It's not so bad if it happens
> during the workday, but trips in to work on the weekend to reboot the server
> are getting old.
>
> There is nothing in my server logs that have provided any information about
> the problem aside from the constant barrage of printer driver errors that
> seem to happen on all Citrix servers. I have been watching the security logs
> to see if the problem happens when any particular user logs on, but I have
> not been able to see a pattern. We also replaced the older server that was
> experiencing this same exact problem, with this new one. We didn't use an
> image or anything so we were very surprised when it happened again.
>
> I opened a ticket with Citrix about this problem but after trying a few
> things that had no effect, they have concluded that it's a Windows/Active
> Directory issue and have wished me luck. They recommended that I monitor
> running processes on the server and when the lockups occur, I should check to
> see if the handle count of any single process is more than 10,000. This
> would then identify the problem. A day later when the server locked up
> again, no process was using more than around 2,000 handles so it appears that
> this is not our problem. I did notice that there was one particular process,
> Outlook.exe, that belonged to our CEO. This was odd since he was not logged
> on at the time. I tried to end the process manually but I was told Access
> Denied. Two other users were also logged on at the time and they seemed to
> be working OK, although the server would not accept any new connections.
>
> I have seen several people all around the interwebs experiencing this
> problem, but so far no solutions have been found for my issue. If anyone has
> some information that might help me get this resolved, I would definitely
> appreciate it. Thanks much. ---Chris

 

[J. Rowland]

RE: "Checking Your Credentials" Error

We have been experiencing the same problems with 5 separate Citrix farms,
different hardware, different levels of MSFT updates, the similarities are:

Office 2007, Citrix 4.5, and Trend A/V. What AV product are you using?
We've found that if we disable the Trend AV process that the problem doesn't
seem to occur, otherwise it happens nearly on a daily basis on some servers.
One thing we have found though is that orphaned Outlook process as a
tell-tale sign of the problem.

It is a pretty interesting freezing, it happens slowly, eventually
(sometimes after 20 minutes) nearly all sessions become unresponsive. We've
been troubleshooting this and have been a bit dispirited by the lack of
support we're receiving from these vendors.

--John C. Rowland

"Chris Thomas" wrote:

> The lockup happened again last night and when I went to the server, I found
> the same condition as last time. There were only 2 users loged on at the
> time, but there was an outlook.exe process still listed that belonged to a
> user that had logged off a few minutes earlier (A different user than
> before). Again, I received "Access Denied" when I tried to kill the process.
>
> Not sure why this single outlook.exe process is hanging like this. Should I
> be posting this in the Outlook/Office group?
>
> Thanks
>
>
> "Chris Thomas" wrote:
>
> > I am running Citrix MetaFrame Presentation Server 4.5 on a Windows 2003
> > Standard Edition Server SP2 with Terminal Services. The server is an HP
> > Proliant DL320 G5 with 3 GB of RAM and a Dual Core Xeon 2.66 GHz processor.
> > We do not publish applications on our Citrix server just a desktop. All
> > users use the Citrix Program Neighborhood client, version 10.100.55836. We
> > are experiencing a problem with this server that has been going on for nearly
> > a year now and we could really use some help.
> >
> > The problem starts when a user calls the Help Desk and tells us that they
> > can't get into Citrix. We then attempt to connect as well as get the same
> > problem. You put in your user name and password, hit enter then you get
> > stuck at a message that says, "Checking Your Credentials". Anyone, no matter
> > if they are domain admin or regular user, receives the same message when they
> > log on. If we go to the server console and log on, we do not see that
> > message. We only see a blank gray desktop, with no icons and no mouse
> > pointer. Oddly enough, the users that were already logged on to the server
> > are able to kep working and not notice any issue. We have waited up to an
> > hour for something to happen at this point, but we eventually have to power
> > off the server with the power button and start it back up. Sometimes we can
> > go a couple of weeks without this happening and sometimes it'll happen a
> > couple times in one day. Once this problem starts, even using RDP to connect
> > to the server produces a blank desktop. It's not so bad if it happens
> > during the workday, but trips in to work on the weekend to reboot the server
> > are getting old.
> >
> > There is nothing in my server logs that have provided any information about
> > the problem aside from the constant barrage of printer driver errors that
> > seem to happen on all Citrix servers. I have been watching the security logs
> > to see if the problem happens when any particular user logs on, but I have
> > not been able to see a pattern. We also replaced the older server that was
> > experiencing this same exact problem, with this new one. We didn't use an
> > image or anything so we were very surprised when it happened again.
> >
> > I opened a ticket with Citrix about this problem but after trying a few
> > things that had no effect, they have concluded that it's a Windows/Active
> > Directory issue and have wished me luck. They recommended that I monitor
> > running processes on the server and when the lockups occur, I should check to
> > see if the handle count of any single process is more than 10,000. This
> > would then identify the problem. A day later when the server locked up
> > again, no process was using more than around 2,000 handles so it appears that
> > this is not our problem. I did notice that there was one particular process,
> > Outlook.exe, that belonged to our CEO. This was odd since he was not logged
> > on at the time. I tried to end the process manually but I was told Access
> > Denied. Two other users were also logged on at the time and they seemed to
> > be working OK, although the server would not accept any new connections.
> >
> > I have seen several people all around the interwebs experiencing this
> > problem, but so far no solutions have been found for my issue. If anyone has
> > some information that might help me get this resolved, I would definitely
> > appreciate it. Thanks much. ---Chris

 

[Chris Thomas]

RE: "Checking Your Credentials" Error

We are using Trend Server Protect on our Citrix server too. We only have a
single farm, but I too have narrowed the problem down to orphaned outlook.exe
processes. The funny thing is that the hanging process always belongs to one
of two different users. The one user had stopped using Citrix for a while
and our server was stable the entire time. The other just recently started
using it and doesn't really log on very often. Unfortunately, he's the CEO.
I have absolutely no idea what causes this outlook process to hang so I'm
currently just in a holding pattern waiting for it to fix itself. Ha. I
haven't tried disabling Trend Micro, but it sounds like that fixed it for
you. I think I may give that a shot.

Good to hear that someone else out there is having the same problem. With
all the internet searching I have been doing on this problem over the last
year or so, I haven't found anyone that knew anything about this. The only
vendor I have spoke to was Citrix and they charged me $400 even though they
were unable to identify the issue. Very frustrating.....

-Chris

"J. Rowland" wrote:

> We have been experiencing the same problems with 5 separate Citrix farms,
> different hardware, different levels of MSFT updates, the similarities are:
>
> Office 2007, Citrix 4.5, and Trend A/V. What AV product are you using?
> We've found that if we disable the Trend AV process that the problem doesn't
> seem to occur, otherwise it happens nearly on a daily basis on some servers.
> One thing we have found though is that orphaned Outlook process as a
> tell-tale sign of the problem.
>
> It is a pretty interesting freezing, it happens slowly, eventually
> (sometimes after 20 minutes) nearly all sessions become unresponsive. We've
> been troubleshooting this and have been a bit dispirited by the lack of
> support we're receiving from these vendors.
>
> --John C. Rowland
>
> "Chris Thomas" wrote:
>
> > The lockup happened again last night and when I went to the server, I found
> > the same condition as last time. There were only 2 users loged on at the
> > time, but there was an outlook.exe process still listed that belonged to a
> > user that had logged off a few minutes earlier (A different user than
> > before). Again, I received "Access Denied" when I tried to kill the process.
> >
> > Not sure why this single outlook.exe process is hanging like this. Should I
> > be posting this in the Outlook/Office group?
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> >
> > "Chris Thomas" wrote:
> >
> > > I am running Citrix MetaFrame Presentation Server 4.5 on a Windows 2003
> > > Standard Edition Server SP2 with Terminal Services. The server is an HP
> > > Proliant DL320 G5 with 3 GB of RAM and a Dual Core Xeon 2.66 GHz processor.
> > > We do not publish applications on our Citrix server just a desktop. All
> > > users use the Citrix Program Neighborhood client, version 10.100.55836. We
> > > are experiencing a problem with this server that has been going on for nearly
> > > a year now and we could really use some help.
> > >
> > > The problem starts when a user calls the Help Desk and tells us that they
> > > can't get into Citrix. We then attempt to connect as well as get the same
> > > problem. You put in your user name and password, hit enter then you get
> > > stuck at a message that says, "Checking Your Credentials". Anyone, no matter
> > > if they are domain admin or regular user, receives the same message when they
> > > log on. If we go to the server console and log on, we do not see that
> > > message. We only see a blank gray desktop, with no icons and no mouse
> > > pointer. Oddly enough, the users that were already logged on to the server
> > > are able to kep working and not notice any issue. We have waited up to an
> > > hour for something to happen at this point, but we eventually have to power
> > > off the server with the power button and start it back up. Sometimes we can
> > > go a couple of weeks without this happening and sometimes it'll happen a
> > > couple times in one day. Once this problem starts, even using RDP to connect
> > > to the server produces a blank desktop. It's not so bad if it happens
> > > during the workday, but trips in to work on the weekend to reboot the server
> > > are getting old.
> > >
> > > There is nothing in my server logs that have provided any information about
> > > the problem aside from the constant barrage of printer driver errors that
> > > seem to happen on all Citrix servers. I have been watching the security logs
> > > to see if the problem happens when any particular user logs on, but I have
> > > not been able to see a pattern. We also replaced the older server that was
> > > experiencing this same exact problem, with this new one. We didn't use an
> > > image or anything so we were very surprised when it happened again.
> > >
> > > I opened a ticket with Citrix about this problem but after trying a few
> > > things that had no effect, they have concluded that it's a Windows/Active
> > > Directory issue and have wished me luck. They recommended that I monitor
> > > running processes on the server and when the lockups occur, I should check to
> > > see if the handle count of any single process is more than 10,000. This
> > > would then identify the problem. A day later when the server locked up
> > > again, no process was using more than around 2,000 handles so it appears that
> > > this is not our problem. I did notice that there was one particular process,
> > > Outlook.exe, that belonged to our CEO. This was odd since he was not logged
> > > on at the time. I tried to end the process manually but I was told Access
> > > Denied. Two other users were also logged on at the time and they seemed to
> > > be working OK, although the server would not accept any new connections.
> > >
> > > I have seen several people all around the interwebs experiencing this
> > > problem, but so far no solutions have been found for my issue. If anyone has
> > > some information that might help me get this resolved, I would definitely
> > > appreciate it. Thanks much. ---Chris

 

[J. Rowland]

RE: "Checking Your Credentials" Error

Chris--

We're running:
Running Trend ServerProtect
Pattern vers: 5.531.00
Engine vers: 8910-1002
Program vers: 5.70.0.1078

The problem started arising for us a couple of months ago. First it was
just one server and it happened about once a month. Then it started
happening to more farms and reached a crescendo over the last 3 weeks. It
was happening to freshly built physical servers, virtual servers, all running
Citrix 4.5, Office 2007, Trend, CA, Windows 2003, and 32-bit and 64-bit
platforms. As usual, the vendors point fingers at one another. Eliminated
virtual servers and 32-bit v. 64-bit quickly then CA Arcserv was removed from
the list.

We patched everything, Citrix blows it off as a Microsoft problem. We
haven't tried Microsoft because the usual pattern we've encountered with
issues like this is some first tier guy in India holds the ticket for a week
and doesn't understand that 25 people are logged into the server and that
tearing Citrix out of the picture poses a problem.

Trend had us uninstall Trend, tear out the stuff in the registry, and
re-install. That was a waste of time. We've turned of Trend for a couple of
days on all but one server, that server continues to have the problem every
day. It does seem associated with just a handful of Outlook users and
involves Outlook processes that are impossible to kill.

We have servers running Citrix 4.5 Outlook 2003 and Trend which are not
impacted.

Let me know how things go on your end. I think you should start talking to
Trend Micro technical support.

Thanks for the update!

--John C. Rowland

"Chris Thomas" wrote:

> We are using Trend Server Protect on our Citrix server too. We only have a
> single farm, but I too have narrowed the problem down to orphaned outlook.exe
> processes. The funny thing is that the hanging process always belongs to one
> of two different users. The one user had stopped using Citrix for a while
> and our server was stable the entire time. The other just recently started
> using it and doesn't really log on very often. Unfortunately, he's the CEO.
> I have absolutely no idea what causes this outlook process to hang so I'm
> currently just in a holding pattern waiting for it to fix itself. Ha. I
> haven't tried disabling Trend Micro, but it sounds like that fixed it for
> you. I think I may give that a shot.
>
> Good to hear that someone else out there is having the same problem. With
> all the internet searching I have been doing on this problem over the last
> year or so, I haven't found anyone that knew anything about this. The only
> vendor I have spoke to was Citrix and they charged me $400 even though they
> were unable to identify the issue. Very frustrating.....
>
> -Chris
>

 

[mike neary]

re:Checking Your Credentials" Error

re:Checking Your Credentials" Error

You might want to try installing UPHCLEAN on the affected servers to see if that can unload processes and the user's profile from the server when the user logs off. Just go to Microsoft's site and search for UPHCLEAN.

 

[jim maurer]

Same issue

Same issue

I've had the same problem with one Win 2003R2 SP2 server with Citrix 4.0. Usually happens once a month and takes 5 minutes for the user to login from an HP thin client, but today it takes about 20 minutes.
Outlook doesnt seem to be the issue.
Trend is unloaded, but still installed.
Funny thing is other servers have been imaged from this server, but they dont have the problem.
I've watched Process Explorer, Regmon and Filemon, but none seem to show anything of value.
Perhaps I'll reimage.