[NNatic]

We are currently running BES 5.03 SP3 on its onw VM against Exchange 2010 with 120 users or so.

We have been battling with two things:
1. Emails are delivered in clumps and slowly
2. Services stop working almost guaranteed once a week a random time (not on same day or same time) which is becoming embarrassing to our IT Dept.

While speaking with a tech who was not going to assist us with our issues, I have come to understand that the clumps is typically due to the BES rescanning mailboxes instead of delivering the mail as it comes in. Why would it do this? What causes this initial email to not be seen / delivered to the device?

I would like a few things for number 2. For one, is there an app or anything that would monitor bes functionality? The services are never stopped or anything simple like that, so i dont know what we can do as far as monitoring is concerned. We use PRTG for network monitoring currently.

What would cause it to stop functioning this often?

Thanks in advance for the help. It has been pretty frustrating.

[MWPatterson]

You should see the following in your application logs if you are having the rescanning issues:

Event Type: Information
Event Source: BlackBerry Messaging Agent <Server Name> Agent 3
Event Category: None
Event ID: 50106
Date: 6/8/2011
Time: 7:04:43 PM
User: N/A
Computer: <Server Name>
Description:
Stopping BlackBerry Mailbox Agent 3 for Server <Server Name>


Event Type: Information
Event Source: BlackBerry Messaging Agent <Server Name> Agent 3
Event Category: None
Event ID: 50076
Date: 6/8/2011
Time: 9:04:41 PM
User: N/A
Computer: <Server Name>
Description:
Starting BlackBerry Mailbox Agent 3 for Server <Server Name> - Version 5.0.2.18

It that is the case, I would remove MAPI from the system and then reinstall it with a supported version. I have had this happen befoer and I had it happen last week so I will be doing this on one of your servers. If that is not showing in your application logs in wondows the problem exists somewhere else and we need to investigate it more.

To elaborate, if MAPI gets corrupt on the server it will cause all sorts of issues like this. The rescanning of the mail boxes happens when the Messaging agents restart and they have to look at all the exchange mailboxes again and will start delivering email but, it will return to normal depending on the mail flow in exchange, how big your exchange server is, and how large each person mail box is. This just takes time.

[MWPatterson]

For monitroring, it is personal preference, we use Operations Manager with some custom monitors for specific events on the BES Servers to trigger alerts.

[NNatic]

Originally Posted by MWPatterson

You should see the following in your application logs if you are having the rescanning issues:


It that is the case, I would remove MAPI from the system and then reinstall it with a supported version. I have had this happen befoer and I had it happen last week so I will be doing this on one of your servers. If that is not showing in your application logs in wondows the problem exists somewhere else and we need to investigate it more.

To elaborate, if MAPI gets corrupt on the server it will cause all sorts of issues like this. The rescanning of the mail boxes happens when the Messaging agents restart and they have to look at all the exchange mailboxes again and will start delivering email but, it will return to normal depending on the mail flow in exchange, how big your exchange server is, and how large each person mail box is. This just takes time.

I looked and dont have any of these other than stopping or starting services due to troubleshooting so this may not be the issue. I ran a utility I found from RIM for diagnosis and it states that all emails today (except a small handful) are from notify and not a rescan which i find interesting.

Maybe i do need to redo the mapi profile and get the most up to date dll files etc.

What specifically do you watch the event log for (for bes functionality logging).

[knottyrope]

are the affected devices low on memory? I find many times when emails come in clumps a battery pull on the device fixes it when BES is not the cause.

Newer devices with more memory are not as affected it seems.

[MWPatterson]

Originally Posted by knottyrope

are the affected devices low on memory? I find many times when emails come in clumps a battery pull on the device fixes it when BES is not the cause.

Newer devices with more memory are not as affected it seems.

Good point, did not even think of that one.

[NNatic]

man am I tired of this thing. :(

Seems as though the devices are not receiving them in clumps and it also seems as though emails are NOT being picked up on rescans. So my comments above are inaccurate.

I have run the server resource kit and come up with the attached log. What i dont understand is how the server time is so low but the total time is so high. What could cause this?!? I just dont get it.

Can someone dissect this for me please?

*edit... logs are a few posts down... they were too large and failing. I stripped email addresses out of them.

[NNatic]

they are all bberry bolds with os6 for the most part.

[NNatic]

here are the log files.

I will most likely redo the mapi profile in the am since we have the day off.