SNMP Service Does Not Start or Hangs on Shutdown

The SNMP service may not start, or may stop responding (hang) on shutdown or when you manually stop the service by using the Services tool or the net stop snmp command. Also, you may receive the following error message:

This problem can occur if you previously uninstalled the Systems Management Server (SMS) version 1.2 client from your Windows NT Server-based computer. By default, SMS 1.2 client Setup installs the Snmpelea.dll file, even if the SNMP service is running on the server. Note that this does not occur with SMS 2.0. When you uninstall the SMS 1.2 client, the Snmpelea.dll file and its associated references in the registry are not removed, and this may cause problems with the SNMP service that is still running on the server.

WARNING: If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

To work around this problem, delete the Snmpelea.dll file after you uninstall the client, and then delete its associated registry keys:

1. Delete the %systemroot%\system32\Snmpelea.dll file.
2. Delete the following registry keys, where REG_SZ: is the numerical listing of the extension agent:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\SNMP_EVENTS
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\system\CurrentControlSet\Services\SNMP\Parameters\ExtensionAgents\REG_SZ:SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SNMP_EVENTS\EventLog
3. Restart the server. Note that if you do not restart the server, event ID 1105 ("The SNMP service is ignoring extension agent key SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\SNMP_EVENTS\EVENTLOG because it is missing or misconfigured") is logged in Event Viewer.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.