Exchange 2010: Unable to open Exchange Management Console - Initialization Failed

Problem: Exchange Management Console in Exchange 2010 will not open and references a server that is down or has been removed from the environment.

Error Verbiage: Initialization Failed

The following error occurred while attempting to connect to the specified Exchange server 'exchange.contoso.com':

The attempt to connect to https://exchange.contoso.com/powershell using 'Kerberos' authentication failed: Connecting to the remote server failed with the following error message : WinRM cannot process the request. The following error occurred while using Kerberos authentication: The network path was not found.

 

Resolutions:

Method 1:

1. Close all MMC/EMC instances before proceeding.
2. Open Registry Editor (regedit) as the user you run the EMC under.
3. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ExchangeServer\v14\AdminTools
4. Look for value NodeStructureSetting.
5. If it is there, back it up and then remove it.

Method 2:

1. Close all MMC/EMC Instances before proceeding.
2. Open Powershell or Powershell IDE as the user you run the EMC under and execute the following command:.
3. Remove-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\ExchangeServer\v14\AdminTools\ -Name NodeStructureSettings
4. Close Powershell

After performing either of the methods above to remove the registry entry you should be able to open the Exchange Management Console and it will discover another Exchange server and connect.

Comments

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Have to add my experience... Deleted the NodeStructure key, attempted opening EMC, same old same old.... had a user who's EMC did open up, so I had them export the key, then deleted mine, imported theirs and all is working fine... Ahhhhhhhh! Got Exchange?

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Looks like your resolution is working pretty much across the board - didn't get to your post in time to know if it would have worked for me. Got my Initialization Failed using Kerberos authentication error fixed by starting the world wide web publishing service.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  @John Healy You either have removed a server from the environment, have a server offline, or a server is inaccessible due to stopped services or.local firewall.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Thank you!

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Thank u

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Thank you!

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  if all else fails. Login to IIS
  Stop all websites except the default website containing the ecp, ews owa folders etc.
  Then reconnect to the emc.
  If the connection is made, go back to IIS and enable each site individually while testing the EMC.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Hi did not worked for me. now iam getting diferent erro message after removing this regentry. still cannot access either of the consoles exchagne 2010.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  @Jac - If the time between your Exchange Server and Domain vary that much then you need to correct your time sync design. By design, every windows server will get it's time from the domain aka domain controllers. Then usually you configure one DC to get it's time from a precise source. If you have windows server with various times then either the time was never set on the server when it was installed, was set incorrectly, or is possibly using a third party time sync/NTP tool. If the server is a VMware virtual machine make sure the VMware Tools are NOT configured to sync guest time with the VMware Host. And yes, a large time delta between the server and domain will cause various issues as it causes Kerberos authentication to fail.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  First method worked for me, thanks.

• Anonymous
  March 26, 2013
  Perfect solution, spent more that 2 hours and finally found your post thanks

• Anonymous
  March 28, 2013
  Thank you!! #1

• Anonymous
  March 28, 2013
  You the man.. appreciate it

• Anonymous
  May 13, 2013
  This steps I followed but did not resolved the problem, I have the Exchange server 2010 installed on the same server running active directory on server 2008 r2 standard edition. It is really frustrating and why can't Microsoft give us a hint , i have lost my 2nd job interview just to this problem

• Anonymous
  May 23, 2013
  Sometimes cache credentials also gave the same error.

• Anonymous
  June 07, 2013
  Worked perfect for me!

• Anonymous
  June 25, 2013
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 08, 2013
  Worked ! :) thanks

• Anonymous
  July 08, 2013
  Worked for me too. Many thanks. Any idea how it got broken?

• Anonymous
  July 08, 2013
  Worked Great :)

• Anonymous
  July 15, 2013
  Thanks a lot... :)

• Anonymous
  July 19, 2013
  Quick and Eazy.  The way I like it!!!  Thanks

• Anonymous
  August 21, 2013
  Such a Great Post !

• Anonymous
  August 29, 2013
  Had the same issue on a fresh install. After I started to replicate Free & Busy and OAB sys files from my 2003 exchange.  I could no longer connect from 2010 exchange to the 2003 exchange.  Tried deleting the mentioned reg key it did not work for me>> Any ideas??

• Anonymous
  September 24, 2013
  Thanks Man..

• Anonymous
  September 30, 2013
  Yup, sure enough, the PowerShell solution worked perfectly for me in a Production environement. THANK YOU!

• Anonymous
  October 30, 2013
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  November 18, 2013
  Thanks for the solution given work like charm

• Anonymous
  December 06, 2013
  Great Post...Thanks

• Anonymous
  January 15, 2014
  awesome 1st method worked great. thanks again.

• Anonymous
  January 24, 2014
  perfect ... worked for me. i wonder why microsoft exchange not able to see that the configured node is down and it shud automatically detect the next exchange server and connect to it. Why have to perform this manual solution.

• Anonymous
  January 28, 2014
  Thank you very much. work like megic . this happen to me whan configred a internrt adress on remote sbs console

• Anonymous
  February 14, 2014
  The solution didn't work for me but in reading the comments i seen "Chaitanya 24 May 2013 1:16 AM Sometimes cache credentials also gave the same error." Once I removed all cached credentials from Control PanelAll Control Panel ItemsCredential Manager opened up the EMC and all worked perfect again!

• Anonymous
  February 25, 2014
  Amazing, worked like a charm. Thanks you very much.

• Anonymous
  March 10, 2014
  Muchas gracias!!!!!

• Anonymous
  March 29, 2014
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  April 21, 2014
  Gracias!

• Anonymous
  May 07, 2014
  how to back it up ?? thx

• Anonymous
  May 21, 2014
  Pingback from Exchange 2010: Cannot open EMC (Kerberos) | Things Geeky MKII

• Anonymous
  May 21, 2014
  Pingback from Exchange 2010: Cannot load EMC (Initialisation Failed) | Things Geeky MKII

• Anonymous
  May 21, 2014
  Pingback from Exchange 2010: Cannot load EMC (Initialisation Failed) | Things Geeky MKII

• Anonymous
  May 21, 2014
  Pingback from Exchange 2010: Cannot load EMC (Initialisation Failed) | Things Geeky MKII

• Anonymous
  July 09, 2014
  Experienced this after a Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard to Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise upgrade, thanks!

• Anonymous
  July 29, 2014
  Worked perfect for me (option 1) Adam - in Regedit go to File - Export with the reg entry selected :)

• Anonymous
  July 31, 2014
  Thanks alot Sir, it is very useful for resolving exchange mgmt console opening..
  

• Anonymous
  August 06, 2014
  deleting the node in Admin tools did not work for me. I followed Marty_v suggestion of starting the world wide web publishing service and mine was running. I stopped the service and then restarted it and that fixed my EMC
  thanks

• Anonymous
  August 18, 2014
  Quick & easy, worked like a charm. Thanks

• Anonymous
  August 28, 2014
  DIdn't work at first, have to stop/start the World Wide Web Publishing service and THEN let it discover the Exchange Server. Then I could get into the MMC.
  Got an easy fix for Windows Update service being stuck in "Stopping" not updating... at all ??

• Anonymous
  September 02, 2014
  Its time sync issue. First verify which domain controller,the exchange is connected to with below command
  cmd:> set logon
  And verify the time of that DC with exchange time and change if required. then logoff and logon exchange server and see console works.

• Anonymous
  September 03, 2014
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  September 08, 2014
  Thx it work great....:)

• Anonymous
  September 09, 2014
  You are a star! Thanks

• Anonymous
  September 10, 2014
  In my case, restarting WWW Service resolved the isue.
  Thanks!

• Anonymous
  September 20, 2014
  Great. How come you came up with the solution?. Thanks indeed.

• Anonymous
  October 10, 2014
  Man, thanks soooo much. I've tried so many things trying to get this fixed. Your solution worked! Gracias!!!

• Anonymous
  October 11, 2014
  Excellent Thanks !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
  

• Anonymous
  November 03, 2014
  Thanks man

• Anonymous
  November 04, 2014
  excellent solution

• Anonymous
  November 07, 2014
  Perfect Solution Greate

• Anonymous
  November 16, 2014
  Man your great !!! Method 1 work great

• Anonymous
  November 16, 2014
  thanks a lot buddy

• Anonymous
  November 19, 2014
  This worked for me.Thank you for the post.

• Anonymous
  December 03, 2014
  The easiest way I found was to open command window and restart IIS ,"IISRESET" that fixes it for me.

• Anonymous
  December 11, 2014
  Love it Loveit Worked perfectly...

• Anonymous
  January 05, 2015
  The first solution is great. After deleting you must restart the server.

• Anonymous
  January 08, 2015
  Thank you. Great solution

• Anonymous
  January 19, 2015
  Thank you it is perfect

• Anonymous
  January 19, 2015
  @ Dan G. Thanks! Restarting IIS fixed it for me!
  
  

• Anonymous
  January 24, 2015
  A NEW solution to this problem, check that the key HKLM.UsersDefaultEnvironment exists. My console and EMS mysteriously stopped working, after running Procmon from SysInternals suite I found it was looking for the Environment key in the default profile, not mine. Added the Environment key and WHOOSH, everything fixed. Only took me about sixteen hours to find this after trying all the other steps.

• Anonymous
  January 27, 2015
  thank you

• Anonymous
  February 06, 2015
  Thanks so much! Yours was the first thread I came upon after discovering this issue and it was a quick fix. Thanks again.

• Anonymous
  February 09, 2015
  In my case this was a time issue. Exchange server was off network time by over 6 minutes. Set correct time, logged off and back in. Was able to open EMC just fine!

• Anonymous
  February 10, 2015
  TYVM for posting this.

• Anonymous
  February 11, 2015
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  February 16, 2015
  thanks it is working but connecting to another server,still geting the same error when manualy trying to connect the same server

• Anonymous
  February 23, 2015
  Yay! Thank you! But the question is what suddenly caused it to happen in the first place.....

• Anonymous
  February 25, 2015
  I used to first method and it worked well.
  
  Thanks,

• Anonymous
  March 10, 2015
  Yes it worked.
  

• Anonymous
  March 31, 2015
  Thank you so much... life saver!!

• Anonymous
  March 31, 2015
  Yes Its working. But i want to work EMC in that server to check the configuration. do you know any other solution

• Anonymous
  April 23, 2015
  Thanks a lot for given exact solution ..
  
  It's working fine..
  

• Anonymous
  May 22, 2015
  Perfect and easy solution, Thank you!

• Anonymous
  June 08, 2015
  Thanks.. it worked for me..:)

• Anonymous
  June 08, 2015
  Easier with the PowerShell command. Great post. Thank you very much.

• Anonymous
  June 12, 2015
  I have been trying to sort this issue out for 2 years, gave up looking until today (had created a new admin in order to manage exchange) this sorted out the issue!! hurrah and thank you.

• Anonymous
  July 06, 2015
  Thank you very much this was the only method that worked!!!

• Anonymous
  July 19, 2015
  Work perfectly thank ypou

• Anonymous
  July 19, 2015
  Great solution, many thanks

• Anonymous
  July 20, 2015
  it works

• Anonymous
  July 20, 2015
  Restart all IIS services (Or restart the the site in IIS Manager.) Fixed the problem for me.

• Anonymous
  July 24, 2015
  THANK YOU! I never would have found this!!!

• Anonymous
  July 27, 2015
  No comment, my problem is resolved, perfect solutions !

• Anonymous
  July 28, 2015
  if everything else above fails, Log onto the Exchange Server, go to Control Panel, Credential Manager, Windows Vault, Remove All Accounts from Windows Credentials

• Anonymous
  July 28, 2015
  If the above fails, log onto the Exchange Server, go to Control Panel, Credential Manager, Windows Vault, Remove All Accounts from Windows Credentials

• Anonymous
  August 12, 2015
  Worked for me. Thank you so much.
  

• Anonymous
  August 20, 2015
  thanks,

• Anonymous
  August 26, 2015
  Excellent !!! thank you.

• Anonymous
  September 02, 2015
  Perfect

• Anonymous
  September 13, 2015
  I have Small Business Server 2011 Standard - from time to time this problem comes up and generally I do a server restart and it then works. However, I just tried method 1, and it worked. Just a word of advice - when you try to open of the MMC again, and try to expand the management console to get to your server, it does a search for the Exchange servers in the environment and in my case, even though it is all part of the same server, it took about two minutes before the search finished so be patient. What I don't know is if this will permanently fix the problem - I guess time will tell since this problem comes back about once every two months or so.

• Anonymous
  September 22, 2015
  Excelente. Muchas Gracias.

• Anonymous
  September 24, 2015
  Thanks alot you the man

• Anonymous
  September 30, 2015
  Thanks a lot.

• Anonymous
  October 07, 2015
  Thanks man thanks

• Anonymous
  October 15, 2015
  Brilliant - Thanking you.

• Anonymous
  October 15, 2015
  you are great..you saved my frustration ... Thank you very much

• Anonymous
  October 25, 2015
  Perfect!!

• Anonymous
  October 29, 2015
  it is not resolve for me can you explain me where to run above command exactly & before run this command can i delete the Remove-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:SoftwareMicrosoftExchangeServerv14AdminTools -Name NodeStructureSettings from registry
  

• Anonymous
  October 30, 2015
  @amol You run the command from within PowerShell under the user you normally run the Exchange Management Console as. Method 2 - Step 3: The command deletes the registry key HKCU:SoftwareMicrosoftExchangeServerv14AdminToolsNodeStructureSettings
  If you are not experienced at PowerShell or navigating the registry you should probably request assistance from your IT department, specifically your Windows Administrators. Let them know that they need to run the command under your user account.
  
  Please make sure you are experiencing the situation and "EXACT" same error as outlined in the article above.

• Anonymous
  November 09, 2015
  The registry change didn't make any difference for me. However restarting the world wide publishing service appears to have resolved the issue.

• Anonymous
  February 24, 2016
  Worked Perfectly thank you very much for your post.

• Anonymous
  February 26, 2016
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  March 17, 2016
  Hi
  
  It does connect to other server but not local, what might be the problem?
  
  Thanks

• Anonymous
  March 21, 2016
  After all steps had to log off and back in and then it worked.

• Anonymous
  April 04, 2016
  I had the same problem with EMS and EMC ( Discover-ExchangeServer -UseWIA $true -SuppressError $true' ) access denied to http://server/PowerShell
  on the Windows SBS 2011
  
  It must enable HTTP persistent connections in IIS on the default Web site.
  - In IIS, Under Default site, including the Exchange directory, launch the menu En-heads http response
  - Open menu "Set Common Headers"
  - Enable persistent HTTP connections:

• Anonymous
  April 04, 2016
  Thanks,