I'm Robert Marshall, director and senior consultant at SMSMarshall Ltd who's specialism is in the Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager product and all of its dependent products covering all aspects from Architecture, Implementation, Migration to Break-Fix.
I've been using computers for over 30 years, beginning as a programmer and now a senior consultant in an enterprise product. I only count my career as starting 17 years ago when I began my first serious role as a deployment engineer. I've seen 8 bit through to 64 bit, the rise and constant refinement of the GUI, the rise of the Internet from land-line based modem access to the powerful broadband connections we have today, mobile phones come into existence, and I've seen Microsoft evolve from a handful of employees to the company it is now while pretty much tinkering with every OS they have released; As well as seeing an industry that has evolved around those humble beginnings to become what we have today. You could call me an IT Dinosaur but I'm still as mentally able as I was back then, perhaps even more adept now since I've had broad exposure to so much and seen trends come and go. I'm a keen technical puzzle solver, which sets me apart as I love to solve gnarly problems around my area of specialism.
I like to share, i do so by blogging here, and helping out when I can as a moderator and answering questions when I have time on the TechNet Social forums for ConfigMgr 2012 and ConfigMgr 2007. I am a guest poster on TechNet UK Flash magazine and an MVP since 2009 (Most Valuable Professional) in the ECM (Enterprise Client Management) exclusively dedicated to ConfigMgr. the MVP status helps me to help others in more depth due to the closeness to the product group and access to other MVP's the program affords me.
The blogs pretty much about ConfigMgr, but on the odd occasion I also use it as a platform to express my random urges to post something I've stumbled across, be it technical or non-technical, and which I imagine would entertain you or what not as equally as it did me.
(2013)
Came across an SMS Admin today with an interesting problem. He has WSUS\SUP + all the other gubbings all on the one box, nothing really out of the norm and yet he gets Status Message ID 6701 followed by 6703 exactly 5 minutes later (the timeout value) in his WSYNCMGR log when attempting to get WSUS to SYNC with Microsoft Updates. Really he should be seeing 6701 followed by 6704 (recalling from memory here!) and 6701 means that the Sync is initialising and 6704 that it is in progress.
Odd thing is, if you remove the FQDN for the Site server (role wizard) the problem disappears. I could have left it like that, but didn't want too as it's etched in stone that supplying an FQDN for the Site server is good working practice. Well, it is.
Anyway, I discovered that if you add the Site servers FQDN to the Site servers Internet Explorer Trust Sites then add the FQDN back in to the Site server, it all slots in to place and performs the Sync successfully.
Now am not too sure of the root cause here, this in my eyes is a work-around and as its not a documented step I'm assuming not that many of you are actually experiencing this issue. If you've seen this, getting this, this fixed it for you then let me know!
On the subject of SUP\WSUS i've seen some real funny (well not so funny, maybe strange is a better word!) things happening, nearly all of which has been related to a non-standard "environment". And then i've seen SUP\WSUS go on (install), sync and bring down updates without any hiccups.
If you are experiencing SUP\WSUS issues then go back to step 1, analyse your environment and try to determine what is putting SUP\WSUS nose out of joint, as the product does work, first time, even if you follow the instructions verbatim
I could be caused by the IE Enhanced Security Configuration. Depending on your IE configuration, the Internet or Local Intranet options are too restrictive
Yeah it has to be that, and should be easy to reproduce. I'll tinker and see, if there is one, what setting causes this.
I now think adding the FQDN in to trusted sites isn't a work-around, if you consider that if IE Enhanced Security is on and the settings that stop the SUP working may need to remain in-place to obey corporate policy.