Troubleshooting Windows Assessment Services

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Applies To: Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2

The following information can help you troubleshoot common problems.

This topic includes:

  • Log files

  • Set up a Symbol Server

  • Unable to connect to server

  • Computer already exists in inventory

  • Run button is unavailable

  • Inventorying test machine fails with WS_E_OPERATION_TIMED_OUT

  • Image deployment failures don’t have enough information on the monitoring page

  • DISM Error During Computer Inventory

  • Test computers must be reimaged if you change the Server name

  • “Machine not reachable” errors

  • Running Windows ASC from a server other than the Windows Assessment Services server

  • The dumps folder does not contain any dump files

Log files

  • Log files are copied to the server when you add computers to the server inventory. They are stored at C:\relax\logs.

  • A server log captures events of the Windows® Assessment Services. This log file can be found at C:\Windows\Temp\relaxservice.tracelistener.Tracing.

  • Errors coming from the UI can be viewed in the Event Viewer on the client computer under Applications and Services Logs - Windows Assessment Services Client. The log file is an ETL file located at %systemroot%\system32\Winevt\Logs\Windows Assessment Services Client.evtx.

  • Image deployment logs (Windows PE) are copied from the test computers to %SystemDrive%\relax\logs

  • On Windows Server® 2012, Windows Deployment Services (Windows DS) issues can be found in the Event Viewer under Applications and Services Logs -Microsoft -Windows - Windows Deployment Services Diagnostics.

  • On Windows Server® 2008 R2 you must enable Windows DS logging by setting the following:

    • HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\WDSServer\Providers\WDSPXE!TracingDisabled to 0

    • HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Tracing\WDSServer!EnableFileTracing to 1

    The WDS log will be generated at %SystemRoot%\tracing\wdsserver.log.

  • The WinRM log can be found in the Event Viewer under Applications and Services Logs -Microsoft -Windows -Windows Remote Management.

  • If results are not copied to the server, you can locate them on the test computer. The log file at %SystemDrive%\relax\<GUID>\job\results.log points to the results folder where the results were saved.

Set up a Symbol Server

Some assessments require access to symbols. In some cases the information in the assessment results can be incorrect or have missing information if a symbol server is not available. In many cases this dependency is satisfied by Internet connectivity and access to the Microsoft public symbols server. In other cases where connectivity to the Internet is not available such as a lab environment, you can set up a private symbols server or install the symbols on the local computer to get the full benefits of the assessments.

To set the symbols environment variable on a test computer

  1. Open File Explorer, right-click Computer, and select Properties.

  2. In the Properties window click Advanced System Settings.

  3. In the Systems Properties window, on the Advanced tab, click Environment Variables.

  4. Under System variables, click New to set the symbols environment variable by using one of the following paths:

    1. Use the public symbols server (requires Internet connection)

      Connect the computer to the Internet so that it can access the Microsoft symbols server, and then configure the _NT_SYMBOL_PATH environment variable to use the Microsoft symbols server at http://msdl.microsoft.com/downloads/symbols.

    2. Use a network connected symbols path (requires local network connection)

      Connect the computer to the local intranet and then configure the _NT_SYMBOL_PATH environment variable to use an intranet symbols path.

    3. Use a local symbols path

      Download the symbols to the Windows Assessment Services server computer, and point the test computer to this location by setting the _NT_SYMBOL_PATH environment variable to use a path to the symbols on the server, such as \\WASServer\relax\symbols.

To set up internal symbols

  1. Install the ADK, and initialize WAS.

  2. Get an IPsec boundary exception for the WAS server machine. This will ensure that WAS test machines are able to access the Relax share.

  3. Join the WAS server machine to the domain.

  4. Add a domain user to the WAS server machine into the Administrators group that has access to internal symbol server.

  5. Stop the WAS service by running the following command from an elevated command prompt:

    net stop WASSVC

  6. Change the service logon account to the new domain account.

  7. Run the following command from an elevated command prompt, replacing <path to internal symbols> with the appropriate path:

    SETX_NT_SYMBOL_PATH \\<path to internal symbols> /M

  8. Restart the machine.

For more information about how to set the symbols path and download symbols, see MSDN: Symbols Support. For information about how to troubleshoot missing symbols, see Missing Symbols.

Unable to connect to server

If the Windows® Assessment Services - Client (Windows ASC) cannot connect to the server, you might receive the following error message:

Unable to connect to the remote server: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or an established connection failed because the connected host has failed to respond.

Check the server status by using the sc query wassvc command. If the server is not running, start the service by using the net start wassvc command.

Warning

The sc query command only works if it is run on the Windows® Assessment Services server.

Computer already exists in inventory

If you receive the following message, the test computer already exists in the Windows Assessment Services inventory:

Execute any scenario manually. Hit Exit to Reboot

If you do not see the computer entry in the Server Inventory window, close and then re-open that window to refresh the content.

Run button is unavailable

If the Run button is unavailable, make sure that you have selected specific computers and images in the Assets details. If you have selected specific computers and images, but you do not see any assessments on the Results page, close and then re-create the current job.

Inventorying test machine fails with WS_E_OPERATION_TIMED_OUT

If you receive the following error:

Error updating machine configuration in RelaxServer. Please check that the server is available and try again later. (ErrorCode:-2143485946)

Check the error log at C:\Relax\CompleteDeployment.log for additional error details and rerun CompleteDeployment.cmd.

Image deployment failures don’t have enough information on the monitoring page

Error code: Exiting Scenario Deploy: ErrorId=2

Either you are using an image of unsupported format, the unattend answer file is missing or the image file is missing.

Error code: Exiting Scenario Deploy: ErrorId=38

The image file is corrupted.

Error code: Exiting Scenario Deploy: ErrorId=87

Bcdboot failed to update the BCD store. This is specific to some UEFI computer prototypes. No workaround is available at this time.

Error code: Exiting Scenario Deploy: ErrorId=193

Bcdboot failed to update the BCD store. An image of incompatible architecture was applied to a test computer.

Error code: Exiting Scenario Deploy: ErrorId=-2147024809

Diskpart failed to find any hard disk drive that could be used to apply an image to.

DISM Error During Computer Inventory

If you receive the following error while taking inventory of a computer, you must use the x86 Windows PE image for the bootable USB drive that you created for inventory.

An error occurred. You cannot service an x86-based image from an x64-based host that does not support WOW64. Try the operation again from a host environment that supports WOW64. 
Error running Driver Scavenge. ErrorCode 193.

When you inventory a computer, driver information is gathered and stored at <%systemdrive%\relax\driver using DISM. DISM cannot run the driver servicing command on an X86 Windows image, from a Windows PE X64 environment. For more information, see DISM Supported Platforms.

Resolution

Use (or create) a bootable USB drive created for X86 architecture. For more information, see Windows Assessment Services Setup and Configuration.

Test computers must be reimaged if you change the Server name

If you rename the Windows Assessment Services server and re-initialize it, you must redeploy Windows on the test computer before you run additional assessments.

“Machine not reachable” errors

When running assessments remotely, Windows Assessment Services relies on DNS to resolve the test computer names. If DNS has duplicate entries for the same computer name, one from a domain joined computer and another from a workgroup computer, Windows and WinRM will pick the computer that DNS resolves to.

If you receive an error that includes "Machine Not Reachable", check the DNS entries for duplicates.

Note

The computer name must contain only alphanumeric characters and dashes. If the computer name contains an underscore or other extended characters, the computer may not be discoverable via Domain Name System (DNS).

Running Windows ASC from a server other than the Windows Assessment Services server

If you are running Windows ASC on a Windows server and you do not have Windows Assessment Services installed on that server, push notifications will fail to enable in Windows ASC when you launch it.

Workaround

On the server where Windows ASC is installed, enable the optional component MSMQ-Server using the following DISM command from an elevated command prompt.

Dism /Online /Enable-Feature:MSMQ-Server

Or run Windows ASC on a client computer, or the same server where Windows Assessment Services is installed.

The dumps folder does not contain any dump files

By default, dump files are not copied to the server after assessment runs. If you want to collect dumps for assessment runs, edit <Relax directory>\Scripts\Harnesses\Axe\CompleteAssessment.cmd, and change the value for set_copydumpstoserver to true. By default, this value is false.

See Also

Concepts

Windows Assessment Services Technical Reference
Additional Resources for Windows Assessment Services