Messages remain in the local delivery queue because of a disconnected SMTP mailbox

You may notice the following problems on a Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server computer or on a Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 computer:

• Delivery of e-mail messages to a local private or public store is not working.
• Messages remain in the local delivery queue.
• Messages that are sent from user accounts that are homed on the server do not leave their Outbox folders.

Additionally, if you dismount and then remount the information store, the following event error messages may be logged in the application log:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: MSExchangeTransport
Event Category: Exchange Store Driver
Event ID: 326
Date: date
Time: time
User: N/A
Computer: ServerName
Description:
Service Account failed to logon to the store as /o=organization/ou=First Administrative Group/cn=Configuration/cn=Connections/cn=SMTP (ServerName)/cn={CCCF3BE6-219C-4379-985D-851B766EDDC7}. Error code : 0x80040148. For more information, click http://search.support.microsoft.com/search/?adv=1.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: MSExchangeTransport
Event Category: Exchange Store Driver
Event ID: 326
Date: date
Time: time
User: N/A
Computer: ServerName
Description:
Service Account failed to logon to the store as /o=organization/ou=First Administrative Group/cn=Configuration/cn=Connections/cn=SMTP (ServerName)/cn={CCCF3BE6-219C-4379-985D-851B766EDDC7}. Error code : 0x80040158. For more information, click http://search.support.microsoft.com/search/?adv=1.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: MSExchangeIS
Event Category: General
Event ID: 1194
Date: date
Time: time
User: N/A
Computer: ServerName
Description:
Accept clients on external interface SMTP failed with error 0x80004005. For more information, click http://search.support.microsoft.com/search/?adv=1.

If you track one of the messages, you can see that local delivery is tried repeatedly (contoso.com is a placeholder for the domain name):

This issue may occur if one of the following conditions is true:

• The Active Directory object for the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) mailbox is missing. Or, the SMTP mailbox is disconnected.
• Incorrect attributes are set for the SMTP mailbox.

Warning If you use the ADSI Edit snap-in, the LDP utility, or any other LDAP version 3 client, and you incorrectly modify the attributes of Active Directory objects, you can cause serious problems. These problems may require you to reinstall Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server, Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, or both Windows and Exchange. Microsoft cannot guarantee that problems that occur if you incorrectly modify Active Directory object attributes can be solved. Modify these attributes at your own risk.

To resolve this problem if the Active Directory object for the SMTP mailbox is missing, create a new mailGateway object in Active Directory. Because this object has a new GUID, the information store will create a new SMTP mailbox object the next time that the store is mounted. To create a new mailGateway object in Active Directory, follow these steps:

1. By using the LDP utility, locate the following container:
   CN=Storage Group,CN=InformationStore,CN=ServerName,CN=SERVERS,CN=Name of Administrative Group,CN=Administrative Groups,CN=Organization Name,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=Domain Name
2. Find the information store that has the objectGUID property that is referenced in event 326. To do so, follow these steps:
   1. Open the Properties dialog box for each information store in the storage group.
   2. Check the objectGUID property.
   
   
   Note If you are using the ADSI Edit snap-in instead of the LDP utility, the GUID is shown in another format than the one that is contained in event 326. In this case, you have to convert the GUID. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
   322308 Event ID 9554 appears ater you modify mailbox permissions
3. If the store is a public store, go to step 6. Because a public store does not have a system mailbox, you cannot verify that the SMTP mailbox is disconnected.
4. In Exchange System Manager, expand the mailboxes container, and then run the cleanup agent.
5. Verify that the SMTP (ServerName-{GUID of Mailbox Store}) object is present and that it is connected.
6. If the SMTP (ServerName-{GUID of Mailbox Store}) object is not present or if it is disconnected, follow these steps:
   1. Start ADSI Edit, and then locate the following:
      CN=Connections,CN=Organization Name,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=Domain Name
   2. If an object that is named SMTP (ServerName-{GUID of Mailbox Store}) exists, delete it.
   3. Right-click the connections container, and then create a new object that has the following attributes:

      Class:	mailGateway
      cn:	SMTP (ServerName-{GUID of Mailbox Store})
      homeMTA:	Distinguished Name of the Server's Message Transfer Agent
      deliveryMechanism:	2
      homeMDB:	Distinguished Name of the Mailbox Store
      legacyExchangeDN:	/o=OrganizationName/ou=Admin Group Name/cn=Configuration/cn=Connections/cn=SMTP (Server Name)/cn={GUID of Mailbox Store}

      Example:

      Class:	mailGateway
      cn:	SMTP (ServerName{37C1C681-D0CF-4E2E-B464-41FC38A8B11B})
      homeMTA:	CN=Microsoft MTA,CN=ServerName,CN=Servers,CN=First Administrative Group,CN=Administrative Groups,CN=Contoso,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=contoso,DC=com
      deliveryMechanism:	2
      homeMDB:	CN=two,CN=First Storage Group,CN=InformationStore,CN=ServerName,CN=Servers,CN=First Administrative Group,CN=Administrative Groups,CN=Contoso,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=contoso,DC=com
      legacyExchangeDN:	/o=contoso/ou=First Administrative Group/cn=Configuration/cn=Connections/cn=SMTP (ServerName)/cn={37C1C681-D0CF-4E2E-B464-41FC38A8B11B}

   4. Dismount all information stores.
   5. Mount the information store.
   6. Verify that you now have an additional SMTP mailbox that appears to be connected.
   7. To clear the disconnected SMTP mailbox, right-click the mailbox, and then click Purge.
7. Verify that mail flow works again.

To resolve this problem if incorrect attributes are set for the SMTP mailbox, follow these steps:

1. Start ADSI Edit, and then locate the following object:
   CN=Connections,CN=Organization Name,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=Domain Name
2. Make sure that the following attributes are correct:
   • homeMTA
   • homeMDB
   • legacyExchangeDN
   Note You must check the attribute values on the same global catalog server that is being referenced by the Exchange Server computer on which the message is stuck.

If a private store is affected, you can create a new information store, move all users to the new information store, and then delete the old information store. If the problem affects a public store, content replication to other servers does not work any more. You can try to export the public folder content to .pst files and then use the PFAdmin tool to restore the permissions.

In some cases, it may also be necessary to repair or to recreate the SystemMailbox object to restore mailflow.

For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: