Yes, you CAN do that with CRM

More on CRM 3.0 Installations ON SBS 2003

I’ve been having problems with my CRM 3.0 SBE install on a SBS 2003 Premium install. Based on a lot of different posts in many different newgroups as well as some input form the Microsoft CRM team, I decided to try several installs under better controlled and documented conditions to see if I could understand what was happening. Here is a summary of my experiments

Assumptions: CRM 3.0 SBE is advertised to only work with SBS 2003 Premium and only with SBS SP1 installed. To me this means one of two variations: SBS 2003 with SQL 2000 SP4 and no ISA or SBS SP1 with SQL 2000 SP4 and ISA 2004. I also made a gross assumption that a system patched to SBS 2003 SP1 will act that same as a system installed as SP1 (I know this is probably faulted but I just don’t have time to build out that many different servers.)

As a starting point for both tests I built out an SBS 2003 virtual server image as follows and then enabled UNDO disks so I could go back to this point for the start of each test.

1. Build out a virtual server image of SBS 2003 SP1 with SQL 2000 SP4 (using MSDN download ISO images) with the following characteristics:
1. 2GB RAM, Single 16GB Hard Drive, Dual NIC
2. Internal IP Address: 192.168.24.2
3. External IP Address: 192.168.16.205 (connected to the Internet through my internal network)
4. Domain: demo.local
5. Machine Name: SBS
6. External domain name: sbs.crm-demo.com (used for OWA and RWW access) Note that there is no host record for this domain name.
2. Run the connection wizard to establish connection to the Internet.
3. Install Virtual Machine Additions.
4. No additional patching, hot fixes, or updates applied.
5. Save image and then enable UNDO disks for remaining changes.

Test 1: Install CRM 3.0 SBS on SBS 2003 SP1 with SQL 2000 SP4 (No ISA)

1. Restart virtual server image from rolled back state.
2. Load CRM 3.0 SBE form MSDN ISO Images using all default settings.
3. ERROR: SQL Reporting Services cannot find IP address corresponding to domain name sbs.crm-demo.com. I would have expected SQL Reporting Services to use the machine name of sbs.demo.local rather than the name assigned to the default web site certificate (sbs.crm-demo.com). In my case there is no way that the sbs.crm-demo.com domain name would resolve because there is no host record matching this value. However even if it did resolve it would not work because it would resolve to a public IP address and it would likely be blocked.
1. WORK AROUND: Create a forward lookup zone in the SBS DNS Server for crm-demo.com and then create a host record pointing sbs.crm-demo.com to the IP address assigned to the internal NIC (192.168.24.2). Run a  IPCONFIG /flushdns and then retry the failed step.
2. Note that additional actions will be required after setup completes to remove dependency on this DNS entry.
4. ERROR: SQL Reporting Services cannot access the Report Server at sbs.crm-demo.com/ ReportServer due to a 401 access denied error.
1. According to KB 896861 this is an issue resulting for Windows 2003 SP1. The KB offers two options to workaround the error. I chose to add the DisableLoopbackCheck DWORD value to the registry.
5. Completed install without additional errors.
6. Rebooted after installation completed
7. Ran through CRM setup wizard.
8. At this point any time I tried to run a report I was getting challenged for credentials from the report server at sbs.crm-demo.com. If I supplied credentials the report would continue.
9. In order to remove the reference to sbs.crm-demo.com I edited the registry value for SQLRSServerURL at HKLM\Software\Microsoft\MSCRM from https://sbs.crm-demo.com/ReportServer to https://sbs.demo.local/ReportServer and performed an IISRESET at the command line.
10. Removed the forward lookup zone for crm-demo.com from the SBS DNS server and flushed the DNS cache.
11. Able to access CRM reports with out additional authentication. All seems to work well

Test 2: Install CRM 3.0 SBS on SBS 2003 SP1 with SQL 2000 SP4 with ISA 2004

1. Restart virtual server image from rolled back state.
2. Install ISA 2004 from the SBS Premium Technologies with SP1 using the MSDN ISO image. 
3. Modified the default web site setup as follows per recommendation from Barry Givens (CRM PM)
1. Set the port 80 and port 443 IP addresses to use all IP addresses rather than the distinct 192.168.24.2 and the 127.0.0.1.
4. Set the DisableLoopbackCheck DWORD value per KB 896861 based on experience in first test.
5. Ran CRM 3.0 SBE install using MSDN ISO images
6. ERROR: Had an error during the SRS install but error cleared on RETRY.
7. Install finished with out further error.
8. Had a service start error on server startup. Microsoft Firewall Service did not start properly. The service did start from a manual start command.
9. Ran through initial setup wizard
10. Tested reports without issue.
11. Ran the SBS Internet connection wizard and verified that the default web site IP address properties were returned to their pre-crm values.
12. Opened CRM and tested reports. Flawless

It appears that the recommended fixes for installation when ISA 2004 is on the SBS 2003 box work. The issue I had in Test 1 Step 3 is perplexing. Oddly enough when I looked at the HKLM\Software\Microsoft\MSCRM\SQLRSServerURL value from Test 2 (ISA Installed) it was https://publishing.demo.local/ReportServer ( a local domain path) rather then the external domain name that I saw in my install without ISA 2004.

Published Tuesday, November 22, 2005 9:38 PM by crm