Protection Engine service stops unexpectedly during service start

Products

• Protection Engine for NAS
• Protection Engine for Cloud Services

Issue/Introduction

Symcscan simply will not start. Its status is disabled every time After rebooting Windows, starting the service displays error 1053.

Environment

SPE 7.9.x or 8.x is installed

On Windows, the following error appears either as a dialog box within services.msc or in the Application Log of the Windows Event Viewer:

Windows could not start the Symantec Protection Engine service on Local Computer.

Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start of control request in a timely fashion.

Resolution

To identify the specific error 

1. Attempt to start the service for Protection Engine.
2. Look at the next to last line in SymantecProtectionEngineAbortLog.txt
3. Search the BROADCOM KB for the matching error.
4. If you are unable to find a match, open a support case for further assistance.
   To quickly assist, support will need you to supply answers to the following questions:
   - What Operating System is present?
   - What version of Protection Engine is installed?
   - What patches are applied to Protection Engine, if any?
   - What is the exact error on the next to last line in SymantecProtectionEngineAbortLog.txt?
   - Is the UI for SPE enabled?
   - Has Java JRE been updated recently?

 

To attempt to start the Protection Engine service

• Do one of the following:
  • On Windows, within the services.msc (the Services console) right click on the Symantec Protection Engine service, then click Start
  • On Windows, at the cmd prompt, type:
    net start symcscan
    
    
  • On Linux, at the bash prompt, type:
    service SYMCscan start

 

To look for the most recent error in SymantecProtectionEngineAbortLog.txt

1. Do one of the following:
   • On Windows, at the cmd prompt, type:
     type SymantecProtectionEngineAbortLog.txt
     
     
   • On Linux, at the bash prompt, type:
     cat SymantecProtectionEngineAbortLog.txt | tail -2
     
     
2. Look at the next to last line of output. For example: 
   
   <timestamp> 900 Unexpected exception thrown : XML file did not validate - configuration.xml         <--- The next to last line always contains the error related to the stop
   <timestamp> 0 Symantec Protection Engine is shutting down; logs may contain more information.  <--- Ignore the final line. it will always be the same
   
   

NOTE: In the example output above, the configuration.xml file is corrupt, preventing the start of the Protection Engine service. Usually, this sort of corruption occurs when you directly edit the .xml files which contain the configuration of SPE, instead of using xmlmodifier.exe. Support almost never sees this as a support case. Expect that your error and cause is different.

 

 

 

Additional Information

What if SPE failed to start but did not create an abort log?
See 239046.

Other examples:

• Error: 100 Java virtual machine failed to load : CJNIBridge: failed to find supported version of Java
  Cause: Supported Java version not found and Java UI enabled.
  Disable the Java based UI, then start symcscan. If Java is the only problem during start, then see here for a list of supported Java versions, install a supported Java version, and re-enable the Java UI. If the Windows Application Log also recorded a 1053 error, see 241542 for troubleshooting path.
  
  
  
• Error: 300 XML files did not validate : Error Validating D:\Program Files\Symantec\Scan Engine\configuration.xml. Element 'CloudName': This element is not expected. Expected is ( admin )
  Cause: User error during application of SPE hotfix 8.0.0 HF06. For steps. see 175834 
  
  
  
• Error: 300 XML files did not validate : Error Validating C:\Program Files\Symantec\Scan Engine\configuration.xml. Element 'custom', attribute 'version': [facet 'enumeration'] The value '080200' is not an element of the set {'80201'}.
  Workaround: Backup configuration.xml, then copy configuration.xml from a machine where SPE upgraded successfully. Otherwise, uninstall SPE, delete Scan Engine folder, reinstall scan, re-configure from screenshots.
  
  
  
• Error: 400 CSAPI Failed to initialize
  Cause: Multiple possible causes. If on SPE 8.0.x, be sure to have 16GB RAM, then upgrade to SPE 8.2.2 to get on a supported build.
  If already on 8.2.x, enable CSAPI logging, attempt to start service again, and look in csapi.log for more details.
  For CSAPI logging on Windows, see 157519. For Linux steps, see 164895
  
  
  
• Error: 500 Logging failed to initialize : Unable to open file /opt/SYMCScan/log/SSE20200904.log..
  Cause: Lack of free space on the partition or lack of permissions. Linux? see 198845
  
  
  
• Error: 600 Failed to create temporary directory : Could not create temporary work directory.
  Cause: Lack of free space on the hd partition or lack of permissions. Linux? see 198845
  
  
  
• Error: 900 Unexpected exception thrown : XML file did not validate - category3.xml.
  Workaround: Move category3.xml to another folder, then attempt to start symcscan service.
  
  
  
• Error: 1300 Error validating SSL/TLS configuration : Server certificate or server key parameter is empty, please provide correct values..
  Cause: Enabled SecureICAPScanning without specifying a certificate.
  Solution: disable SecureICAPScanning or specify a certificate. 
  
  
  
• Error: 1400 Failed to initialize IPC Channel
  Cause: SPE not able to communicate with CAFAgent component which handles comms with central web console. See 174149