Troubleshooting Event Ids 9518, 9175, and 454 at MS Exchange Startup

The Event Ids in Microsoft Exchange Server form most important parts of system diagnosis. These cryptic error messages allow the user to diagnose the logging problems. While there are various reasons for the occurrence of these event id, the most important is the corruption in the 'Information Store'. For easy resolution of any event id, the user can restore the database from an updated backup. However in case of absence of an updated backup, the user requires a powerful Exchange Server Repair software to repair the database.

As a practical case, your server locks up for no reason and when you reboot, the MS Exchange 2003 does not start. On viewing the event log, you view a series of event ids:

“Event Type: Error
Event Source: MSExchangeIS
Event Category: General
Event ID: 9518
Date: 6/7/2005
Time: 5:56:43 PM
User: N/A
Computer: CRC2K3
Description:
Error Log file is corrupt starting Storage Group
/DC=local/DC=cr/CN=Configuration/CN=Services/CN=Microsoft
Exchange/CN=CityRealtyMail/CN=Administrative Groups/CN=First Administrative
Group/CN=Servers/CN=CRC2K3/CN=InformationStore/CN=First Storage Group on the
Microsoft Exchange Information Store.
Storage Group - Initialization of Jet failed.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: MSExchangeSA
Event Category: MAPI Session
Event ID: 9175
Date: 6/7/2005
Time: 6:07:09 PM
User: N/A
Computer: CRC2K3
Description:
The MAPI call 'OpenMsgStore' failed with the following error:
The Microsoft Exchange Server computer is not available. Either there are
network problems or the Microsoft Exchange Server computer is down for
maintenance.
The MAPI provider failed.
Microsoft Exchange Server Information Store
ID no: 8004011d-0526-00000000

Event Type: Error
Event Source: ESE
Event Category: Logging/Recovery
Event ID: 454
Date: 6/7/2005
Time: 5:56:43 PM
User: N/A
Computer: CRC2K3
Description:
Information Store (448) First Storage Group: Database recovery/restore
failed with unexpected error -501.”

Next, when you try to mount the 'Mailbox' or 'Public Folder', you encounter the below error message:

“The database files in this store are corrupted”

Cause:

The cause for the occurrence of the above error message is corruption of Exchange Server database.

Resolution:

To resolve the above error message and to repair the Exchange Server database, you have to use an effective Exchange Server Repair application. Such Exchange Repair utilities employ extensive scanning techniques to repair and restore corrupt Exchange Server database.

MS Exchange Repair is an answer to all logically corrupted Exchange Server databases. With recovery of deleted mailboxes, the Exchange Repair application repairs databases created in Exchange Server 5.5, 2000, 2003, and 2007. The repaired EDB file is saved in a .pst file format.

Information Store Corruption due to RAID Issues

One of the common reasons for Exchange Information Store to get corrupt is hardware issues. Thus when you identify server consolidation for Exchange Server computer, experts suggest you to adhere to Windows Server Catalog tips. The most important is a reliable storage subsystem and that's the reason you are often recommended to use Redundant Array of independent Disk (RAID) configuration. This not only increases performance by allowing multiple I/O operations but also adds to reliability. But unfortunately there can still be instances that may bring corruption to message store. If one or more of RAID components fail, the Exchange Information Store can catch corruption. In such situation, you need an Exchange Recovery solution to repair the database and recover the lost data.

Consider you use a RAID 2 system to run Exchange Server. All the Information store data including the log files are stored on the same drive. You observe that one of the RAID drives shows typical corruption issues. So you replace the drive, but you experience similar kind of problems with other drives as well.

Later, you notice that you cannot mount the Information Store. When you run eseutil /mh command to check the integrity of the database, it shows that Information store is corrupted. The database files and log files (typically, e00.log file) are damaged.

Cause

Since disk issues are repeatedly observed, it indicates issues with the RAID controller that has ultimately corrupted the Information Store database files.

Solution

You need the following solutions to deal with such problems:

1. Run eseutil /p command to repair the corrupted database. Keep in mind that this can delete the corrupted pages, so to prevent against critical data loss, it is recommended to use the command on a database backup.
2. Restore from a valid backup. But it is likely that database backup may also not exist in usable state. The reason is that the corruption problems have been continuous for considerable time and it is possible that you might have backed up the corrupted Information Store.
   
3. Use a third-party Exchange Recovery utility. The Exchange Server Recovery software can scan and then repair the corrupted Exchange database using powerful, yet safe, algorithms.

Exchange Server Recovery Software is a reliable tool that repairs corrupted Exchange database and extracts mailboxes as *.pst files while keeping the original database unaffected. The Exchange Recovery Tool supports MS Exchange Server 2007, 2003, 2000, and 5.5. The tool can also recover deleted mailboxes.