Problem connecting to Exchange 2000 server with Outlook 2002

[Cory]

My hope is that someone can point me in the direction of some resource
that will help me troubleshoot and authentication problem. I have a
user on XP Pro at home connecting to the work Exchange 2000 Server via
VPN who can not authenticate. The connection is sound but whenever she
tries to connect it fails. There are no relevant event log entries
made on the server where Exchange is installed and only logs for WMI
failure on the client machine.

Possible factors:
1- This started happening shortly after the Exchange server crashed
the other day. It looks like a GroupShield update triggered the IS to
crash. The system was rebooted and everyone else can access it fine.
May nor may not be related.
2- WMI is messed up on the client machine. Acts like a corrupt
database but the normal fix of deleting the database and rebooting
doesn't work because the OS has a lock on it even though the WMI
service is stopped. I'll try fixing that next but it requires a trip.
However according to the logs WMI had been a problem long before this
so I doubt this is the problem.

Things I've tried
1- Rebooting the machine
2- Creating a new profile and attempting to connect to a mailbox that
has not been accessed before on that machine. No luck.
3- OWA works
4- File level access works
5- Deleted all passwords under "Manage my passwords" on her machine
with no luck.
6- Other VPN users can connect and I can connect from my office to the
Exchange server with my VPN connection to her mailbox or mine.
7- System restore prior to a point in time when the user could access
Exchange. No luck.

Like I said I really only hope to have someone point me in the
direction of some KB article or something to give me some direction in
troubleshooting the problem but any ideas or advise would bee good
too.

 

[Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]]

Hi - you've provided a lot of very good detail, thanks. The only thing I
think we're missing is the exact error/symptom she gets when she tries to
connect. When the profile was created, did the mailbox/server names resolve
properly? Is the profile set up to prompt her for her domain credentials
when she connects to the Exchange server?

Can she ping the Exchange server by name? You've said that file-level access
works but I'm not sure if you mean to a share on the Exchange server
itself...

 

[Cory]

Oh, of course!

The exact error/symptom is that it fails to authenticate and prompts
the user for name and password again. No errors in the client event
log and no errors on the server's event log either.

When we originally set her up it resolved the server and mailbox OK
but now if I try to add another profile it asks me to authenticate if
I hit the "Check name" or whatever the button is called. Even if I use
the domain administrator account it doesn't let me do the check name
thing.

As far as the profile being set up to prompt her I'm not exactly sure
what you mean. It's is not a member of the domain so the first time
one connects it asks for credentials and then saves them so one is
never prompted again. I have deleted the saved password but it doesn't
fix the Exchange problem. If I try to do a UNC browse to the server
machine name it will prompt me again for credentials one time of
course but Outlook still prompts for password.

Yes I can ping the server IP address and it's solid and the latency is
low.

Thanks for your help. I just don't know what to try next. Seriously I
think I'll try reinstalling Outlook and if that doesn't work reinstall
the OS. But of course I would rather not.