Month: August 2015
ConfigMgr 2012 R2 Windows Services
A customer recently asked me what Windows services are used by a ConfigMgr 2012 R2 primary site. It was a great question, to which I intuitively knew the main services, purposes, and impacts if they were faltering … but I had never seen or compiled such a list before. In scouring through TechNet, I was unable locate a single source from product documentation. As such, I created my own (outlined below) which generated from a variant of sources.
Note that SMS Executive is well known to have dozens of “threads” or operations that it performs. I too could not locate a single source for product documentation with details on those threads. So if you need that information, I recommend getting a copy of System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager Unleashed.
| Service | Purpose | Service Dependencies | Affected Functionality |
| AI Update Service Point | Communicates with SC Online for updates to the AI database | RPC | ConfigMgr Asset Intelligence role |
| Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) | Transfer files in the background using idle bandwidth | DCOM, RPC, RPC Endpoint Manager | Transfer of content to clients and DPs |
| SMS Agent Host | ConfigMgr client service | WMI | Site systems with the MP role installed will be impacted |
| SMS Executive | Main ConfigMgr service | Network, Network Provider, Workstation | All ConfigMgr functionalities |
| SMS Notification Server | Provides ConfigMgr “fast channel notifications” | RPC | Notification for clients to initiate time-sensitive tasks as soon as possible |
| SMS Site Backup | Executes the ConfigMgr maintenance task for backups | Network, Network Provider, Workstation | The maintenance task for backups will fail. This is not applicable if using SQL backups and not the ConfigMgr backup task. |
| SMS Site Component Manager | Installs and repairs any ConfigMgr components on site system servers | Network, Network Provider, Workstation | The ConfigMgr hierarchy will not function correctly |
| SMS Site SQL Backup | Contributes to the ConfigMgr maintenance task for backups | Network, Network Provider, Workstation | The maintenance task for backups will fail. This is not applicable if using SQL backups and not the ConfigMgr backup task. |
| SMS Site VSS Writer | Contributes to the ConfigMgr maintenance task for backups | Network, Network Provider, Workstation | The maintenance task for backups will fail. This is not applicable if using SQL backups and not the ConfigMgr backup task. |
| SQL Server (MSSQLSERVER) | SQL server for ConfigMgr | None | All ConfigMgr functionalities |
| SQL Server Agent | Executes jobs, alerts, and tasks | SQL Server (MSSQLSERVER) | Unable to email alerts |
| SQL Server Reporting Services | SQL reports | None | Accessing ConfigMgr reports in either the console or website |
| Windows Deployment Service Server | Provides OSD capabilities | Ancillary Function Driver, Server, TCP/IP | PXE boot, imaging from the server |
| World Wide Web Publishing | Microsoft IIS | HTTP, Windows Process Activation | ConfigMgr site and client communications, reporting website, application catalog portal |
| WSUS Service | Used by ConfigMgr software updates | BITS | Processing client scan statistics and compliance, retrieving the scan.cab |
t3chn1ck 