Provisioning Layer Initialization Failed: ‘Failed To Reconnect To Active Directory Server. Make Sure The Server Is Available And That You Have Used The Correct Credentials.

I came across this strange error while installing Exchange 2010 SP2 on a brand new server running Windows 2008 R2 SP1.

[ERROR] The following error was generated when "$error.Clear(); & $RoleBinPath\ServiceControl.ps1 EnableServices $RoleRoleName.Replace(‘Role’,”)
" was run: "Provisioning layer initialization failed: ‘Failed to reconnect to Active Directory server DC.Domain.Local. Make sure the server is available, and that you have used the correct credentials.’".
[ERROR] Provisioning layer initialization failed: ‘Failed to reconnect to Active Directory server DC.Domain.Local. Make sure the server is available, and that you have used the correct credentials.’
[ERROR] Failed to reconnect to Active Directory server DC.Domain.Local. Make sure the server is available, and that you have used the correct credentials.
[ERROR] Active Directory server DC.Domain.Local is not available. Please retry at a later time.
[ERROR-REFERENCE] Id=AllRolesCommonFirst___56139ce4432346ecb7936afae4c3a9cc Component=EXCHANGE14:\Current\Release\Shared\Datacenter\Setup
Setup is stopping now because of one or more critical errors.
Finished executing component tasks.
Ending processing Install-BridgeheadRole
[WARNING] Setup has made changes to operating system settings that require a reboot to take effect. Please reboot this server prior to placing it into production.
End of Setup

Exchange 2010 setup error with SCOM in the play

It was complaining about the DC being not reachable/ online and that the credentials was wrong. I checked both – DC was up and running without any issues and the credentials was correct.

After having a chat with Microsoft support, I came to know that it is a known issue – at least among the Microsoft PSS guys. The problem was that the server had SCOM agent installed and the server was put in maintenance mode during the Exchange installation.

After taking the server off from the maintenance mode in SCOM, the setup ran without any issues! I had installed Exchange on a number of other servers with maintenance mode on in the same environment. So, the question remains – what exactly is maintenance mode for? ;)

2 thoughts on “Provisioning Layer Initialization Failed: ‘Failed To Reconnect To Active Directory Server. Make Sure The Server Is Available And That You Have Used The Correct Credentials.”

  1. Hi Mr Rajith,
    My Name is Sameer i am a frequent reader of your blogs and it helped me a lot to solve exchange based issue’s . this time i would like to get your professional advice on one of my issue , In my organisation exchange 2010 is installed on 2008R2 DC (FSMO holder), also we have a Win 2003 server as additional DC for the same domain,
    Now i would like to move Exchange 2010 to a new 2008R2 member server without disturbing the existing mail domain , for this kindly advice me on the best practices i should follow or if you have any blog on this subject kindly guide me to the link
    Best Regards,
    Sameer ,KSA

    Reply
    • Hi Sameer,

      Install Exchange 2010 on a member server, all roles. Move all CAS and hub traffic to that server and finally move all mailboxes.
      Remove Exchange from the DC

      Reply

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