Hi all,

I am using System Center 2012 R2 Operations Manager with the Key Management Service Management Pack at version 6.0.7234.0, and I keep receiving the following alert in Operations Manager:

"Idle Minutes Monitor Alert:

Key Management Service (KMS) inactivity exceeded threshold

Knowledge:

Summary:

The purpose of this rule is to alert system administrators to a possible KMS or network outage. This rule monitors the end-to-end operation of KMS activation. A notification event is created by KMS if no activation or renewal requests were logged by KMS (activity event 12290) in the specified time interval. In addition to new activations, periodic renewal requests are expected to occur (default is 7 days). Whether or not this alert is serious depends on the number of machines in the KMS environment, how many are actually connected, and the configured renewal interval.

Causes:

Any failure or incorrect configuration of the KMS service, other Windows components, firewall, hardware, network or routers can trigger the Idle Minutes Alert. This alert can also result from normal behavior, since it is possible that not enough machines attempted to activate or renew during the specified time interval.

Resolutions:

The first step is to determine whether there really is a problem. Start with a known good KMS client and run (with elevated privileges) the script slmgr.vbs -ato . If the activation/renewal fails, it will report an error code. You can direct the client to connect to a specific KMS machine by using the slmgr.vbs -skms option. The request event (12288) and response event (12289) in the Windows Application event log may provide additional information, including the identity of failing KMS machines. If there has been a failure, check the following:

Software Licensing service (slsvc) is running.

Other KMS machine behavior is normal.

KMS firewall port is open (default is TCP 1688).

Attempt to connect to KMS using telnet to the KMS port(you wont be able to do anything other than connect)

Use a network monitor (e.g. netmon) to capture and trace network problems.

There is one Idle Minutes Monitor that is used to monitor for activity. It may be desirable to adjust the time threshold, depending on expected KMS activity."

 

Despite what the alert says, there are activity events with ID 12290 being logged, but they are appearing under the 'Key Management Service' log instead of the general 'Application' log.  I know that my clients are activating with the server without any problems as I have run slmgr.vbs -ato with success on a number of them, and none are stating that activation is required.  This issue was previously raised here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/systemcenter/en-US/1391acf8-f0be-4a48-9039-8d24e275f1fd/kms-idle-time-monitor-raise-wrong-alerts?forum=operationsmanagermgmtpacks, but  I am running Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 and the hotfix KB981314 comes up as 'not applicable to this computer' so I assume it is part of SP1 now.  I have also tried installing KB2692929, as that was cited as being a possible fix here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/systemcenter/en-US/8ec8ae5b-a310-4b0f-9a5f-e0599bceb93a/kms-managementpack?forum=operationsmanagermgmtpacks, however I am still seeing the same alerts.

Would greatly appreciate any further suggestions!

Many thanks

• Edited by Matt Cobley 1 hour 17 minutes ago