Windows 2000 Server may stop responding when you enable Sender ID Filtering on an SMTP virtual server in Exchange Server 2003 SP2

Consider the following scenario. You are running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2) on a server that is running Microsoft Windows 2000 Server. You enable Sender ID Filtering on a Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) virtual server. In this scenario, Microsoft Windows 2000 Server may stop responding.

This problem occurs because of a race condition that is caused by the SMTP protocol. A race condition occurs when a device or a system tries to perform two or more operations at the same time. Because of the nature of the device or the system, the operations must be performed in the correct sequence to be successfully completed.

To work around this problem, disable Sender ID Filtering on the SMTP virtual server. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, point to Programs, point to Microsoft Exchange, and then click System Manager.
2. Expand Servers, expand Server_name, and then expand Protocols.
3. Expand SMTP, right-click the default SMTP virtual server that has Sender ID Filtering enabled, and then click Properties.
4. Click the General tab, and then click Advanced.
5. In the Address list, click the IP address for which you want to disable Sender ID Filtering, and then click Edit.
6. Click to clear the Apply Sender ID Filter check box, click OK, and then click OK.
7. Repeat steps 3 to 6 for each default SMTP virtual server that has Sender ID Filtering enabled.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.

For more information about this problem in Windows Server 2003, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: