[Today's post comes to us courtesy of Justin Crosby]

We have noticed that on some SBS 2003 installs the “Help and Support” service will disappear after installing Windows 2003 Service Pack 2. You may see the following error when opening "Help and Support" from the start menu:

---------------------------
Help and Support Error
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Windows cannot open Help and Support because a system service is not running.

To fix this problem, start the service named 'Help and Support'.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

This issue is currently under investigation, however if you are currently experiencing this issue you can run the following commands to resolve the issue:

1. Open a command prompt.
2. Navigate to %windir%\PCHealth\HelpCtr\Binaries
3. Run this command:

 start /w helpsvc /svchost netsvcs /regserver /install
4. Once this command completes the Help and Support service should now appear in services.msc
5. Start the Help and Support service

Regards,

The SBS Bloggers team

[Edited 7/3/2007 for clarity]

[Today's post comes to us courtesy of David Copeland, Justin Crosby, Mike Lieser and Damian Leibaschoff]

[EDIT] For an updated version of this post, please see http://blogs.technet.com/sbs/archive/2007/04/24/common-networking-issues-after-applying-windows-server-2003-sp2-on-sbs.aspx.

After installing Windows 2003 Service Pack 2 on SBS 2003 with ISA 2004 installed, you may experience the following problems:

-You can no longer successfully connect inbound using VPN (Clients get "Error 800: Unable to establish connection").

-You cannot reliably connect to the Internet using SecureNat.

-Some Outlook clients will fail to connect to the Exchange server (even with ISA 2004 SP2 and KB930414 installed).

(We are still discussing and testing other symptoms that could be related, but if you are having networking issues after the service pack, consider the solution provided on this post. We will update this list as we find more factual information.)

There are several potential causes for these problems, but on this case, we will focus on a feature called Receive Side Scaling that is enabled by Windows Server 2003 SP2 (also enabled in the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Scalable Networking Pack). Note that not all Network Cards will provide this feature, also keep in mind that this might affect SBS machines using RRAS for their NAT solution.

You cannot host Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) connections when Receive Side Scaling is enabled, you have Microsoft Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) and you use Network Address Translation (NAT) on the server. The TCP connections will be reset.

Update: The following KB explaining the behavior is now public:

KB 927695 "You cannot host TCP connections when Receive Side Scaling is enabled in Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 2"  

You can disable this feature from the advanced properties of the network card under the network interface properties or you can perform the registry changes provided below.

You can disable the RSS support from the TCP/IP stack by doing the following:

Warning Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly by using Registry Editor or by using another method. These problems might require that you reinstall the operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that these problems can be solved. Modify the registry at your own risk.
To work around this problem, disable Receive Side Scaling when the computer is configured as an Internet Connection Sharing gateway. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit , and then click OK.

2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters

3. On the Edit menu, point to New, click DWORD Value, and then type EnableRSS .

4. Double-click EnableRSS, type 0 , and then click OK.

5. Exit Registry Editor.

If you are still experiencing problems (like slow file copying), you should also disable Offloading support:

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.

2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters

3. In the right pane, make sure that the DisableTaskOffload registry entry exists. If this entry does not exist, follow these steps to add the entry:

a. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value, and then type DisableTaskOffload .

4. Double-Click DisableTaskOffload, type 1, and then click OK. 

5. Exit Registry Editor.

(Reboot to make both changes effective)

Update 2:

We have seen several situations where even after completing the steps above, VPN would still not work. On those cases, updating the NIC drivers to the latest version resolved the problem. So, make sure you have the latest version for your Network Card drivers. Most manufacturers have released updated drivers very recently.

Regards,

The SBS Bloggers team

[Today's post comes to us courtesy of Damian Leibaschoff]

When you try to approve the Windows 2003 Service Pack update package from the Update Services->Waiting For Review node in the Small Business Server Management console, you may see the following error:

You can safely click Continue and proceed with the approval of the Service Pack.

Reason behind the error is that the update package metadata contains 2 URLs and only 1 KB article referenced. The SBS R2 code actually catches this situation and throws the error above.

Regards,

The SBS Bloggers Team

If you already have ISA 2004 on your SBS 2003 Premium, then this post does not apply to you.

This post applies If you are running SBS 2003 Premium (RTM) with ISA 2000, and wanted to get to SBS Sp1 with ISA 2004.

In the past there was a web page for you to be able to order the SBS SP1 Upgrade CDs, and for Premium customers this included an extra CD with the ISA 2004 version for SBS.

Unfortunately, we are having some problems that we are working to resolve as soon as possible for you to be able to get this media. The order page is being updated to reflect this message.

At this time we don’t have an ETA, but we will keep you posted as far as any updates.

Thanks

The SBS Bloggers team

[Today's tip comes to us courtesy of Mark Stanfill]

Yes.

All component service packs are fully tested against SBS and, in general, can be safely applied to SBS as long as there are no other issues described in the release notes.  Windows Server 2003 SP2 was released yesterday to Microsoft Update/Windows Update.  WSUS servers will show it set for 'Detect only' (i.e. it will not automatically install - you have to approve the installation):

Like the download page says:

"Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 (SBS 2003 customers - Please read Knowledge Base Article 932600 before installing SP2)"

A very limited number of SBS users should be aware of the issue described in KB 932600:

• Users who upgrade from an evaluation copy of Windows Small Business Server 2003 to the full retail version.

• Users upgrading ("supersizing") from Windows Server 2003 to full retail version of Windows Small Business Server 2003.

• Users migrating to Windows Server 2003 from Windows Small Business Server using the Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 Transition Pack.

You probably already know if any of the above apply to you (or will apply in the near future).  If you know that you will be upgrading or transitioning via any of the 3 scenarios above, you should avoid installing Windows Server SP2 until after the upgrade.  It is possible to back out of the service pack install afterwards, but it is a lot more work.  The steps in KB 823836 (referenced in 932600) walk you through the correct uninstall procedure for SP1 and SP2.  The Readme for Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 has the full command line to remove the service pack.  If at all possible, this is something most people will want to avoid.  It is obviously a much cleaner process to upgrade then install the service pack rather than install the service pack, uninstall before upgrade, upgrade, then reapply the service pack.

The usual caveats apply - you should always make a backup before applying the service pack, read the readme, etc.  Transition Pack customers should also be aware of this issue with IE7 installs - http://blogs.technet.com/sbs/archive/2007/01/29/activation-loop-after-completing-the-sbs-transition-pack.aspx.

[Today's post comes to us courtesy of Chris Puckett]

New Sharepoint 2.0 DST update and data update tool

933738  An update is available that addresses an issue in which items that use the Date field and the Time field are off by one hour in Windows SharePoint Services

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;933738

1. This new update is cumulative and includes the previous update (924881).
2. The data update tool functionality has been incorporated into stsadm command with the installation of this update.
3. This update requires Sharepoint SP 2.