Troubleshooting System Center Configuration Manager

Troubleshooting System Center Configuration Manager

by Peter Egerton, Gerry Hampson
Released March 2016
Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
ISBN: 9781782174844

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Book description

Troubleshoot all the aspects of your Configuration Manager installation, from basic easy checks to the advanced log files and serious issues

About This Book

  • Learn to troubleshoot Configuration Manager 2012 based versions of Microsoft System Center
  • Understand the usability of tools and find resolutions to all the issues of Configuration Manager
  • A step-by-step practical guide with the necessary screenshots and examples

Who This Book Is For

If you are new to Configuration Manager or have experience with it, and are interested in identifying, diagnosing and resolving the System Center Configuration Manager administration issues then this book is for you.

What You Will Learn

  • Fix your clients and install them correctly
  • Understand how your Configuration Manager hierarchy works
  • Extend your error information
  • Troubleshoot Configuration Manager roles
  • Know your options when faced with problems
  • Prevent future problems occurring

In Detail

Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager is the most popular enterprise client management solution in the world with some of the best features available. Troubleshooting this product, however, is not always as simple as you might want, not least getting to know the hundreds of log files and understanding how the various components work.

The book starts with discussing the most commonly used tools for troubleshooting the variety of problems that can be seen in Configuration Manager. It then moves to providing a high level view of the available log files, their locations, what they relate to and what they typically contain. Next, we will look at how we can fully utilize and extend all the available information from the console monitoring pane through to the status messages and down into error logging with some further reaches into WMI, SQL, registry and the file structure. You will then learn what the common error codes mean, how to make sense of the less common ones and what they actually mean with respect to Configuration Manager. Further to this, you will pick up widely acknowledged best practices both from a proactive stance when carrying out your daily administrative tasks and also from a reactive position when the green lights start to turn red right down to a complete failure situation. By the end of the book, you will be competent enough to identify and diagnose the root causes of System Center Configuration Manager administration issues and resolving them.

Style and approach

An easy to follow yet practical guide that will advise you on what tools and information you have available to troubleshoot with, if you can extend that information and what to look for solving the issues.

Table of contents

  1. Troubleshooting System Center Configuration Manager
    1. Table of Contents
    2. Troubleshooting System Center Configuration Manager
    3. Credits
    4. About the Authors
    5. About the Reviewers
    6. www.PacktPub.com
      1. eBooks, discount offers, and more
        1. Why subscribe?
        2. Instant updates on new Packt books
    7. Preface
      1. What this book covers
      2. Who this book is for
      3. Conventions
      4. Reader feedback
      5. Customer support
        1. Downloading the color images of this book
        2. Errata
        3. Piracy
        4. Questions
    8. 1. The Configuration Manager Troubleshooting Toolkit
      1. Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager Toolkit
        1. Server tools
        2. Client tools
      2. Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager Support Center
      3. WMI tools
      4. Registry Editor
      5. Group Policy tools
      6. Log file viewer
      7. Error code lists
      8. PowerShell
      9. Network tools
      10. System Center Configuration Manager Management Pack
      11. Community contributions
      12. Summary
    9. 2. Configuration Manager Monitoring Workspace and Log Files
      1. The Monitoring workspace
        1. Alerts
        2. System status
      2. Log files
        1. Client log files
        2. Server log files
      3. Summary
    10. 3. Troubleshooting Configuration Manager Clients
      1. Client installation
      2. The Configuration Manager client
        1. Hidden files
        2. Trigger client actions
        3. Apple Mac OSX client
        4. Unix and Linux clients
      3. Client log files
        1. Application management
        2. Package delivery
        3. Software Center
        4. General client activity
        5. Extended logging
      4. Common problems
        1. External factors
        2. Windows Management Instrumentation
        3. Background Intelligent Transfer Service
        4. Certificates
      5. Summary
    11. 4. Troubleshooting Hierarchies and Site Servers
      1. Hierarchies and Site Servers
        1. Replication
        2. Log files
      2. SQL Server
        1. SQL performance
        2. SQL logs
        3. SQL trace and extended events
      3. The Configuration Manager console
        1. Troubleshooting the console
        2. Debug modes
      4. Active Directory
        1. Schema extension
          1. Attributes
          2. Classes
        2. DNS and DHCP
        3. Certificate services
        4. Discovery
        5. Site boundaries
      5. Summary
    12. 5. Troubleshooting Management Points and Distribution Points
      1. How a management point works
      2. Testing our management point
      3. Troubleshooting our management point
        1. Console
        2. HTTP codes
        3. Log files
      4. Management point common issues
        1. Installation
        2. Prerequisites
        3. Ports and firewalls
        4. Certificates
      5. How a distribution point works
        1. Pull distribution points
        2. Cloud distribution points
        3. Preboot Execution Environment
      6. Troubleshooting our distribution point
        1. Console
          1. Content Status
          2. Distribution Point Group Status
          3. Distribution Point Configuration Status
        2. Logs
        3. WMI
        4. PXE
      7. Distribution point common issues
        1. Distribution
        2. Boundary assignment
        3. Content mismatch
        4. BranchCache
        5. Prestaged content
        6. PXE boot failure
      8. Summary
    13. 6. Troubleshooting Other Roles
      1. Application Catalog roles
        1. Application Catalog website point
          1. Troubleshooting in the console
          2. Troubleshooting in the log files
        2. Application Catalog web service point
          1. Troubleshooting in the console
          2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      2. Asset Intelligence synchronization point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      3. Certificate registration point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      4. Endpoint Protection point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
        3. Antimalware policies
      5. Enrollment and Enrollment proxy point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
        3. Enrollment profiles
      6. Fallback status point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Client deployment success report troubleshooting in the log files
      7. Out of band service point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      8. Reporting Services point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      9. Service Connection point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      10. Software update point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      11. State migration point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      12. System Health Validator Point
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      13. Windows Intune connector
        1. Troubleshooting in the console
        2. Troubleshooting in the log files
      14. Summary
    14. 7. Troubleshooting Common Tasks
      1. Troubleshooting Application Management
        1. Troubleshooting steps
        2. Healthy Configuration Manager client
        3. Application management – expected behavior
        4. Command line testing
      2. Troubleshoot software update deployment
        1. Troubleshooting steps
        2. Software Updates Cleanup
      3. Troubleshoot Operating System Deployment
        1. Troubleshooting steps
        2. IP Helper/DHCP options
        3. Network Interface Card drivers
        4. Duplicate SMSBIOS GUID
        5. Windows Deployment Services issues
      4. Troubleshoot Mobile Device Management
        1. Troubleshooting steps
        2. User synchronization issues
          1. DirSync
          2. Azure AD Sync
        3. Microsoft Support Request
      5. Troubleshooting Certificates
        1. Distribution Point certificate
      6. Configuration Manager and PKI
      7. Summary
    15. 8. Disaster Recovery
      1. Planning for Disaster Recovery
        1. Document your environment
        2. Create Disaster Recovery Plan
      2. Robust backup process
        1. Maintenance task backup
        2. SQL backup
        3. Additional items to be backed up
          1. Content Library
          2. SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS)
          3. Software updates
        4. VM snapshots
        5. Troubleshooting backup failures
      3. Configuration Manager Site Recovery
        1. Recovery options
          1. Recover a Site Server
          2. Recover a Site Database
        2. Prerequisites
        3. Install Primary Site and restore database from SQL backup
        4. Install Primary Site and restore database from Configuration Manager backup
        5. Recover Primary site from Configuration Manager backup
        6. Recover Secondary Site
        7. Additional items to be restored
          1. Content library
          2. Source files
          3. SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS)
          4. Software updates
        8. Testing
      4. High Availability
      5. Summary
    16. 9. Avoiding Trouble
      1. Get it right at the start
        1. Hierarchy
          1. What is a CAS?
          2. Why do some administrators think that they need a CAS?
          3. So why shouldn't you use a CAS?
        2. SQL server
          1. Local or Remote SQL server?
          2. Drive configuration
        3. Antivirus exclusions
      2. Tips to avoid trouble
        1. Software Inventory
        2. Deployments
          1. Operating System Deployment task sequences
          2. Software distribution
          3. Compliance settings
        3. Software updates
          1. Disable Automatic Updates
          2. Maintenance Windows
        4. Collections
        5. Wake-up proxy
      3. Monitoring the site
        1. Monitor Configuration Manager Sites
        2. Monitor WAN links
        3. Monitor Distribution Points
          1. Configuration Manager Console
          2. Log files
          3. Distribution Point Job Manager
        4. System Center Operations Manager
      4. Maintaining a healthy site
        1. Database indexing
        2. WSUS Server Cleanup Utility
        3. Inactive clients
      5. Summary
    17. Index

Product information

  • Title: Troubleshooting System Center Configuration Manager
  • Author(s): Peter Egerton, Gerry Hampson
  • Release date: March 2016
  • Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
  • ISBN: 9781782174844