Topic Last Modified: 2006-05-16

The Microsoft® Exchange Server Analyzer Tool queries the IIS metabase to determine the value of the ServerState property for each instance of a Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) Virtual Server.

The ServerState property presents the current state of the server instance. The states, and the corresponding state codes, are as follows: 1 (starting), 2 (started), 3 (stopping), 4 (stopped), 5 (pausing), 6 (paused), or 7 (continuing).

If the Exchange Server Analyzer determines that the value for the ServerState property for a SMTP Virtual Server instance is equal to 6 (paused), the Exchange Server Analyzer displays an error.

SMTP is the native mail protocol for mail submission and mail transport for Exchange Server. This means that clients use SMTP to send messages and Exchange servers use SMTP to deliver messages and message data.

Virtual servers run under a server process that you can start, stop, and pause—much like other server processes. For example, if you are changing the configuration of a virtual server or performing other maintenance tasks, you may have to stop the virtual server, make the changes, and then restart it. When you stop a virtual server, it does not accept connections from users and you cannot use it to deliver or retrieve mail.

An alternative to stopping a virtual server is to pause it. When you pause a virtual server, this prevents new client connections but does not disconnect current connections. When you pause an SMTP virtual server, active clients can continue to submit messages and the virtual server can deliver existing messages that are queued for delivery. However, no new connections are accepted.

For ordinary messaging operations, Exchange Server SMTP virtual server instances should be started.

To resolve this error, follow these steps to start the SMTP virtual server instance.

To start the SMTP virtual server instance

  1. In Exchange System Manager, right-click the virtual server instance that you want to start.

  2. On the Action menu, click Start.

For more information about how to start, stop, or pause SMTP virtual servers, see the following Microsoft Knowledge Base articles: