Admin Service fails Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion

Description

Scenario 1:

An attempt to start the Enterprise Vault Admin Service after restarting the server, or after restarting all Enterprise Vault Services, will fail with the following error:

Could not start the Enterprise Vault Admin Service on Local Computer. Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.

Scenario 2:

After a successful installation of Enterprise Vault, the following pop up error message appears on screen after restarting the server.

Error registering file: C:\Program Files (x86)\Enterprise Vault\AdminService.exe

Attempting to start the Admin Service after closing the pop-up above returns the error:

Could not start the Enterprise Vault Admin Service on Local Computer. Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.

Workaround:

Warning: Incorrect use of the Windows registry editor may prevent the operating system from functioning properly. Great care should be taken when making changes to a Windows registry. Registry modifications should only be carried-out by persons experienced in the use of the registry editor application. It is recommended that a complete backup of the registry and workstation be made prior to making any registry changes.

1. Change the following registry keys:

‘HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs' from 1 to 0

‘HKLM\SOFTWARE \Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs' from 1 to 0

2. Restart the server.

3. Verify that both registry keys are still set to ‘0’. If either has reverted to ‘1’, view the solution below.

4. Verify Admin Service is now able to start. If not, view the solution below.

NOTE: Disabling LoadAppInit_DLLs will inherently cause issues with whatever process or service relies on DLLs being loaded from AppInit_DLLs. Enterprise Vault, nor any necessary program utilized in the workings of Enterprise Vault, will utilize DLLs written to AppInit_DLLs. with a si

Cause

Certain 3^rd-party programs utilize a series of registry keys to allow an arbitrary list of DLLs to be loaded into each user mode process on the system. This list of DLLs is loaded every time the DLL_PROCESS_ATTACH process of User32.dll is used, and there are very few executables that do not link with User32.dll. The Enterprise Vault executable AdminService.exe does utilize User32.dll.

The list of DLLs being loaded can be found in either location, dependent on whether the program installed in 32-bit or 64-bit:

For 32-bit installations: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\AppInit_DLLs
For 64-bit installations: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\AppInit_DLLs

This list is enabled and disabled using the following registry key:

For 32-bit installations: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs
For 64-bit installations: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs

By default, LoadAppInit_DLLs is set to ‘0’ (disabled). However, if an installed program wishes to utilize AppInit_DLLs, it will often set LoadAppInit_DLLs to a value of ‘1’ (enabled) and may even prescribe its service to reset the value to ‘1’ if it were ever moved back to ‘0’.

Resolution

Discover the 3^rd-party programs connected with all DLLs listed in AppInit_DLLs.
Uninstall 3^rd-party programs connected with the DLLs. Microsoft does not recommend the use of this registry set, and Veritas does not support 3^rd Party processes attaching additional DLLs to User32.dll via AppInit_DLLs.
Once uninstalled, verify that there are no DLLs listed in AppInit_DLLs.
Start the Admin Service.

Issue/Introduction

This artilce features three scenarios that result in a failure to star the Enterprise Vault Admin service.

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