Trouble Upgrading your Exchange 2003 Cluster to SP1?

Note: This information is now available as a public KB article: KB.867624

Some folks on the newsgroups are having difficulty getting their Exchange 2003 clusters upgraded to Exchange 2003 SP1. One example of an error that's been reported:

Not able to upgrade the EVS because of error c1037b44:
"Version of Exchange on this machine does not match the version of Exchange on server ...."

Evan's comment:
Note: If you're running Windows 2003, you will also need to install the Windows/IIS6 GZIP hotfix KB.831464 prior to upgrading the SP1 binaries. This is not specific to clustering, but is a prerequisite for Exchange 2003 SP1 on Windows 2003 (does not apply to Windows 2000/IIS5).

The process to upgrade the cluster to SP1 is very similar to the process followed when upgrading to Exchange 2003 initially, and should look something like this:

1) Move EVS to Node1
2) Upgrade binaries on Node2
3) Take Exchange group resources offline (except for IP, Disk, and Network Name) and move them to Node2
4) Sitting at Node2 (upgraded) Cluadmin, right-click on System Attendant resource and choose "Upgrade Virtual Server"
5) When this completes, bring the resources online on Node2.

Now the resources and the EVS have been upgraded to SP1 and will not be able to come online back on Node1.

6) Upgrade binaries on Node1
7) Confirm that moving the group between nodes is again functional.

Update: June 7, 2004 - It's also been reported that some folks hit a block at Step 4 where the “Upgrade Virtual Server” option isn't available in the context menu. This wouldn't be a big deal, except that the Exchange resources may also not come online and may log Event 1025 “The Exchange virtual server needs to be upgraded before coming online. From the Cluster Administrator Program, select 'upgrade Exchange Virtual Server' from the resource context menu to upgrade this Virtual Server” There are a number of reasons this might happen.

If you've evicted the node from the cluster, your bet bet is to run back through Exchange 2003 Setup and choose the “reinstall” action (which should make the option reappear, and will fix other broken things as well).

But presuming you haven't evicted the node, one possible workaround to get the node back in shape is to trick it into thinking it needs to be upgraded by manually changing the version stored in the ResourceBuild private property. Proceed at your own risk, but a command-line way to do this is:

  CLUSTER RES “<Your System Attendant Resource Name>” /priv ResourceBuild=455081984

Comments

• Anonymous
  May 31, 2004
  thank you.
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2004
  How to install Exchange 2003 sp1
  
  1. Check that hotfix 831464 is installed
  
  FIX: IIS 6.0 compression corruption causes access violations
  http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;831464
  
  If not, installing this hotfix is required
  
  
  Onm NODEB; reboot (you are not prompted but it is required).
  
  
  
  2. Fail resources to NODEB, install hotfix 831464on NODEA, reboot.
  
  3. Install SP1 on NODEA; reboot.
  
  4. Take Exchange Virtual Server offline on NODEB.
  
  [If you don't take it offline before you move the EVS, it attempts to come online and will either fail right back to NODEB or will remain in a Failed state on NODEA.]
  
  This situation depend on how you have previously configured your
  
  Failover/Failback Policies on Microsoft Cluster Server (197047)
  
  Why?
  
  By default, groups are set not to failback. Unless you manually configure your group to failback after failover, it continues to run on the alternate node after the failed node comes back online.
  
  5. Move EVS to NODEA.
  
  
  6. Bring all non-Exchange-service resources online (network name, physical disks, etc.).
  
  
  
  7. Make sure the EVS is hosted on the node that has been upgraded to SP1 when you select to upgrade it and Upgrade EVS (To select Upgrade Virtual Server use Cluster Admin (cludmin.exe) tool while Right Clicking the name of the EVS). After upgrade you will see
  
  
  
  8. Install SP1 on NODEB; reboot.
  
  9. Test failover.
  
  When you install SP1, the option to upgrade the EVS is available on both nodes, but you should only run the option from the node that has really been upgraded to SP1.
  And, if you just failover the EVS from node B to node A, then System Attendant won’t start and the EVS will be failed over again to node B.
  
  
  
  
  After upgrade if you check Exchange version using Exchange 2003 admin tool you will see version SP1 clustered server
  
  
  
  
• Anonymous
  June 04, 2004
  Thank you,
  
  Will Try now
  
  J5- Eric Weintraub
• Anonymous
  June 09, 2004
  The procedure described in this page is not correct, you can't upgrade the EVS if the SP1 wasn't installed on Node 2. Also, dont't forget the SP1 setup asks for a reboot, even on a clustered server.
  
• Anonymous
  June 09, 2004
  Ben -
  
  Can you be more specific? Are the steps you're referring to as incorrect the ones in the actual blog posting, or the ones later on in the comments? The ones in the blog posting tell you to upgrade the binaries on Node2 and then upgrade the EVS while it's also on Node2, so I'm not sure I understand what you mean...
  
  Evan
• Anonymous
  June 09, 2004
  
  Mistake in my previous post:
  
  Sorry, I meant Node 1.
  All that to say that you can't use the "Upgrade EVS" option while not all nodes have been upgraded.
  
• Anonymous
  June 11, 2004
  Ben -
  
  I built out a cluster to test this and I did not have the problems you describe. As long as the upgrade is attempted from the upgraded node AND the EVS has been moved to the upgraded node, the attempt to upgrade will proceed.
  
  If the EVS is sitting on the node which has not yet been upgraded or if you try to do the upgrade in CLUADMIN at the node which has not been upgraded, you will get the c1037b44 error described in the original post.
  
  But if you make sure the EVS is on the upgraded node (with SA offline... only IP, Network Name and Physical Disk online in this group and the MSDTC resource online in its separate group), you'll have success with the "Upgrade Virtual Server" option.
  
  Note that this HAS to work, or else we wouldn't be able to do "rolling upgrades" to SP1.
  
  Evan
• Anonymous
  June 12, 2004
  Upgrading a Windows 2000 Advanced Server cluster to Exchange 2003 SP1.
  
  The hotfix will not apply to IIS, we've tried installing the SP to reported success, however, the Services never completely comonline citing errors with MSExchangeMU (1047) and finally forcing the System Attendant Resource to fail.
  
  Is SP1 not supported on Windows 2000/Exchange 2003 clusters?
• Anonymous
  June 13, 2004
  Larry -
  
  The KB.831464 hotfix is a Windows 2003 hotfix and is not required to be applied to Windows 2000/IIS5 prior to upgrading Exchange 2003 to SP1. Sounds like there is something else wrong with your Exchange cluster. Have you seen this KB article:http://support.microsoft.com/?id=822575? If this article doesn't help you, you may wish to post more information about the errors out in the Microsoft.Public.Exchange.Clustering newsgroup and perhaps someone will have additional ideas. It'll probably be more effective to troubleshoot it in that forum than through this comment interface.
  
  http://support.microsoft.com/newsgroups/default.aspx?NewsGroup=microsoft.public.exchange.clustering&SLCID=US&ICP=GSS3&sd=GN&id=fh;en-us;newsgroups
  
  Evan
• Anonymous
  June 13, 2004
  Whoops. the KB.822575 hyperlink got munged in the last comment. Here's the link again without a question mark at the end: http://support.microsoft.com/?id=822575
• Anonymous
  June 16, 2004
  
  Call me stupid, but I couldn't find this information anywhere!!
  I was stuck on the upgrade, getting an event 8123 - SA couldn't start.
  
  The step I missed was to upgrade the virtual server.
  
  Thanks for the clear and concise directions!! You saved me a lot of pain :-)
  
  
• Anonymous
  July 20, 2004
  Welp, I've installed the KB, SP1 and upgraded the virtual servers. I've got a front-end / back-end configuration and the front end servers were upgraded first (well, i pretty much had no choice there) then the back-end servers and everything seemed to go fine...but...
  
  Now OWA doesn't work. If I go to owa.mydomain.com/exchange/username I get prompted for the Username/Password, but only get a "Page Not Found" returned. I've tried it with and without the domain nameusername configuration with the prompt, but nothing changes.
  
  Any Ideas?
  
  Thanks in advance,
  Rick
• Anonymous
  July 21, 2004
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  July 23, 2004
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  August 06, 2004
  Same problem here, I've got "Upgrade Exchange Virtual Server" option after both nodes were upgraded to SP1.