On Premisis Exchange 2019 EAC text only, no pictures after CU9

Question

EMS works, OWA works, EAC shows logon page, allows logon, but opens to a text only page and none of the links are functional. The timing was after CU9 installed via the Microsoft Update (was not manual installation). CU9 Installation showed as successful and wasn't a retry. The prerequisite update from May 2021 is present.

When I discovered some 1003 errors in event viewer, they started the same date the CU9 update was installed. I followed the correction method published by Microsoft, removed the CU9 update rebooted, installed the CU9 manually from an elevated admin command prompt. No errors.. Oh I tried using the EAC before installing CU9, but the same result. After reinstalling CU9 problem persists.

I attempted also to manually install CU10, but for some unknown to me cause, it fails to find Exchange and says there is no product to update installed.

This is a new production server (less than 30 days) and EAC was working and was how I populated users. I've tried everything I could find in this forum, and others on the web.

I've tried four different browsers in normal mode, with and without 3rd party cookies blocked. I've tried them in privacy modes, safe modes etc. All the same result. I've tried logging in from a Windows 10 workstation on the same network, same result.

I've made certain that all the recommended bindings and certificates are present and matched on the Default Web Site and the Background Web Site.

I've made sure the authentication methods are properly set.

I looked at the config files but didn't spot anything fouled there.

I've tried all the various combinations of URL's I can think of, at least 5 different ones, and appended the 12.2 at the end.

Passes testconnectivity.microsoft.com successfully.

I've been through DNS a bunch. The only firewall is Microsoft. Windows Defender Anti-virus. Very much standard setup. Only variation is Sage 300 has it's own PSQL but EAC was working with that installed. There are 15 users, and I've assigned 2 processors and 64GB RAM (32GB was definitely not enough) to this Hyper-V VM. There appears to be no strain on resources. It's nice and quick. Email works. I haven't tried adding another user, except through EMS and that worked properly.

I've seen mentioned something about an older version of EAC, but I suppose that is for Online Exchange only.

If anyone knows how I can either reinstall EAC, or has an idea how I might find a different Exchange Admin Console (even 3rd party) I sure would appreciate hearing about it.

This is the only Exchange server in this domain, and I have no other 2019 Exchange to reference. All the rest I have are 2010. No 2013 or 2016 available.

If anyone knows this issue please please help! I've been 3 days now trying everything that sounds reasonable to try.

I've attached a screenshot.

Answer 1

Corrections, URL appended with 15.2 (Not 12.2)
Now attempting

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/administration/cannot-access-owa-or-ecp-if-oauth-expired

I missed that because I verified my expiry date was 2026. I've since read another post describing almost the same thing (not the text only part that I'm experiencing) even though their certs were not expired. My new cert is already published, but I'm waiting as others have said for several hours and then check again. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Answer 2

Hi @KK ,

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A!

It has been for a while, have you ever checked if your new certificate could help solve your issue?

If the issue still continues, you could try the suggestions below to see if the issue could be resolved:

• In order to refresh the ECP virtual directory, it is suggested for you to try recycling your MSExchangeECPAppPool like below and see if the issue would have any difference.
  
• Rebuilding the ECP virtual directory can also fix similar issues as well. Please try to remove your current EcpVirtualDirectory and recreate a new one to see if the issue has any difference. For example, like below:
  

Hope these can be helpful.

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Answer 3

Thanks Jeff. I recreated the ECP virtual directory and recycled the Application Pools. No change, no joy. I added IISreset as well and tried MSEdge in Private mode and Firefox in safe mode. I tried a couple of different URLs. Was there anything related to recreating the ECP virtual directory, like a binding or certificate or some other service to restart?

If I try my user without prefixing the domain name, it will give me a text page that does have three icons:
(Icon) Outlook
403
Sorry! Access denied :(
You don't have permission to open this page. If you're a new user or were recently assigned credentials, please wait 15 minutes and try again.
You're still signed in. If you want to sign out, use the link below.
(Icon) sign out sign out
(Icon) Office

This page looks about right and the sign out links work.

I mention this because I've always needed to prefix the domain\username when EAC was working.
Since I don't know what's wrong, I'm giving details in case it means something to anyone else.

Additional info, recreating the Cert even though it wasn't expired did not work here. I'm on EST (GMT+5) and I've been past 19 hours now. EAC will not function. It still opens to the text only page with non functioning links.

In all the web searches I've done, I've only seen two other people report this exact text only screen. Fortunately, for one of those, theirs was a lab setup and after a lot of back and forth the person wiped out the VM entirely and reinstalled from scratch. The other never reported back.

I don't have that easy luxury because this is a production server.

I hope someone here can help!

Answer 4

Log Name: Application
Source: MSExchange Front End HTTP Proxy
Date: 7/23/2021 12:21:04 PM
Event ID: 1003
Task Category: Core
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: SERV1.Corp.contoso.com
Description:
[Owa] An internal server error occurred. The unhandled exception was: System.ArgumentException: Invalid input value
Parameter name: input
at Microsoft.Exchange.Data.ApplicationLogic.Cafe.BackEndServer.FromString(String input)
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.OwaResourceProxyRequestHandler.ResolveAnchorMailbox()
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.ProxyRequestHandler.InternalBeginCalculateTargetBackEnd(AnchorMailbox& anchorMailbox)
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.ProxyRequestHandler.<BeginCalculateTargetBackEnd>b__280_0()
at Microsoft.Exchange.Common.IL.ILUtil.DoTryFilterCatch(Action tryDelegate, Func2 filterDelegate, Action1 catchDelegate)
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="MSExchange Front End HTTP Proxy" />
<EventID Qualifiers="49152">1003</EventID>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>1</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2021-07-23T16:21:04.188249200Z" />
<EventRecordID>370930</EventRecordID>
<Channel>Application</Channel>
<Computer>SERV1.Corp.contoso.com</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>Owa</Data>
<Data>System.ArgumentException: Invalid input value
Parameter name: input
at Microsoft.Exchange.Data.ApplicationLogic.Cafe.BackEndServer.FromString(String input)
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.OwaResourceProxyRequestHandler.ResolveAnchorMailbox()
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.ProxyRequestHandler.InternalBeginCalculateTargetBackEnd(AnchorMailbox& anchorMailbox)
at Microsoft.Exchange.HttpProxy.ProxyRequestHandler.<BeginCalculateTargetBackEnd>b__280_0()
at Microsoft.Exchange.Common.IL.ILUtil.DoTryFilterCatch(Action tryDelegate, Func2 filterDelegate, Action1 catchDelegate)</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>