Hello all,

 

I've been trying to get RPC over HTTP to work in my office, I've been fighting with it throgh the whole night until now with no luck. I configured it per this article on Microsoft technet.

 

Initially when I try to configure outlook to use HTTP to connect to the server, I got error message saying the address couldn't be resolved, after looking through some threads on this forum and reconfigured it several times, I think I'm getting very close to have it working. Right now I'm facing two problem that I just can't work out:

 

1. Certificate error, I recreated a new certificate using Connect to Internet Wizard, and I tried to point that to my server's FQDN (www.companyname.com), also tried to point it to the static IP address. I also deleted all the certificate from client computer and reinstalling them to Trusted CA, but I keep on receiving certificate error when I use IE to connect to HTTPS://sbserver.companyname.com

 

2. When I open Outlook and try to connect to my exchange server using RPC over HTTP, I get error message saying "Microsoft Exchange is unavailable" (that's the entired sentence, I did shorten it in any way)

 

The only thing that's setup a little differently from Microsoft's recommended setting is my SB server does not directly connect to our ISP, detailed setup below:

 

Router (Linksys RV042)

WAN IP 76.79.216.130

DHCP OFF

Router IP 192.168.1.1

 

Port Forwarding:

SMTP     TCP 25-25        --> 192.168.1.2

HTTP     TCP 80-80         --> 192.168.1.2

HTTPS    TCP 443-443    -->192.168.1.2

Sharepoint TCP 444-444   --> 192.168.1.2

IPSec      UDP 500-500     -->192.168.1.2

 

Server

 

WAN

IP 192.168.1.2 (static IP address)

Subnet Mask 255.255.255.0

Default Gateway 192.168.1.1

DNS 192.168.1.3

 

LAN

IP 192.168.1.3 (static IP address)

Subnet Mask 255.255.255.0

Default Gateway (empty)

DNS 192.168.1.3

 

let me know if need more information

Thanks for the help!!

Okay, I get the same cert error....but I installed it and it works fine.... I can connect to your OWA and Remote Workplace.

 

 I would suggest double checking your settings based on this link which is SBS related instead of just Exchange

http://www.smallbizserver.net/Articles/tabid/266/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/57/Configuring-SBS-2003-for-RPC-over-HTTP.aspx 

 The cert is stating sbserver.domain.com....that is what it should be....

 

You don't need port 80 btw...unless your hosting your own www site, which is not recommended on SBS...

 

Are you running dual nics?  They should be different IP schemes....check out here:

Ignore the ISA part if you don't have it

Thanks a lot for the quick response, Mike,

 

Just found out the certificate error I got was an error on the client part, I used another client machine and now I no longer have the cert problem.

 

However, when I try to connect using RPC over HTTP I still receive this error message:

"Outlook cannot logon, verify you are connected to the network and are using the proper server and mailbox name. The connection to Microsoft Exchange is unavailable. Outlook must be online to complete this action."

 

my local FQDN is sbserver.companyname.lan instead of the usual .local since when the first time our infrastructure was setted up we had macs running older version OS.

so in E-mail account setting, under Microsoft Exchange server I used sbserver.businessname.lan.

in RPC proxy server I used sbserver.businessname.com

 

However one thing that puzzles me is when I go to Exchange System Manager --> Server --> Protocols --> HTTP -->Exchange Virtual Server

under the property page of Exchange, the "Exchange Path" field says "businessname.com (default)".

does this mean the address to my exchange server should be .com instead of .lan? or is this irrelevant to what I'm configuring.

 

Please let me know if I set this up correctly.

 

BTW, the way our office network setup is different from what Microsoft have exptected, the connection from ISP goes to our router and there is a direct link from router to a gigabit switch board. There is also a direct connection from SBserver to the router.

 

DHCP server on router is disabled, instead every machine in our office use SBserver as their DHCP server. and in DHCP server setting, the IP range from 192.168.1.1-9 is excluded from IP pool. IP 192.168.1.2 is used for server WAN and 192.168.1.3 is used for server LAN both by manual configured IP address.

 

The reason why we set it up this way, according to the previous IT before me, is because we got significant amount of attack attempt from the net and since we are not using ISA, its just better to keep the SBserver behind a router instead of having our ISP IP point directly to it.

I was suspecting this to be the cause of my problem, but somehow it doesn't seem that way since everything other feature we need is working perfectly fine, with only the exception of RPC-over-HTTP. This office have been running this setup for several years already and haven't had a network problem that we couldn't solve, RPC is the only one the IT department actually gave up. I'm trying to get it resolved once and for all....

 

thanks again, I really appreciate your help

Hi Steven,

 

The DNS on the servernic can never point to the 192.168.1.3 so something is wrong. And if you are using 2 nics in the server, the ipconfig is completely wrong, as they can't be both in the same IP range.

Sorry for the delay in responding, here is the ipconfig file for both sbserver and a client workstation.

 

Again, thanks for the help, I really appreciate it!!

Hi Steven,

 

Can you disable the TCP/IP6 protocol on the server please? Furthermore you are having both servernics in the same IP range, which is totally wrong. Two Nics, a static IP address, ISA, router: http://www.smallbizserver.net/Default.aspx?tabid=266&articleType=ArticleView&articleId=76