Password failing after successful Exchange login

[erich]

I have a frustrating problem that seems to have no solution.

One user I support can start up Entourage (v. 11.2.3), enter the password
and log into the Exchange server (up-to-date AFAIK) and everything begins to
synchronize, and she can send and receive email, but after a minute or so, a
message comes up:

The server for account "Exchange Account" returned
the error "Logon failure: unknown user name or bad
password." Your username/password or security
settings may be incorrect. Would you like to try
re-entering your password?

If you choose "no", the Exchange account is labled as "Not Connected", and
no further synchronization occurs, no mail goes out, etc.

If you choose "yes", you can re-enter the password, and continue to work for
a brief period (maybe 30 seconds). Then the same error message pops up.

What is really weird though is that if you just let the modal error window
sit there and don't choose anything, Entourage continues to synchronize
everything (including chiming when new mail arrives) in the background
despite telling you the password isn't correct.

The weirdness continues in that this user can use Entourage from home via
VPN without any problems and none of our other users are having this
problem. This user does have a fairly significant amount of mail (160MB on
Exchange, and a 750MB local database file), but other than that, is all up
to date and no different than other users.

We have removed all Exchange passwords from the Keychain, tweaked all the
settings and even swapped out the computer with a newer one (with 10.4.5),
and the problem continues.

Only the slash-and-burn fix of deleting the exchange profile and recreating
it has any affect, but alas it is only temporary. It used to work fine for
weeks, but now it only lasts for a few hours before the error returns.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I am at my wit's end with this.

Thanks,
Erich

 

[scott boettcher]

Wow ­ what timing!
I have exactly one client with this issue as well.
I thought I had it fixed bby just clicking the ³save password in OS X
keychain² but that¹s not holding either.
Not sure, but I¹m going to go into Keychain Access utility and deleting the
Exchange keys to see if this helps.

Will repost later.

Scott

 

[erich]

An update...

I set up tcpflow to try to see what what happening. The Exchange server
here requires encrypted communications, so I can't see much but gibberish.
I did notice something odd though...

The synchronizing process would pass lots of traffic until only the calendar
was still synchronizing. Then there was NO TRAFFIC! Entourage claimed it
was synchronizing the Calendar, but no communication was occurring. Now, it
had always taken a long time for this users calendar because it is chock
full past and future (including attachments in the calendar items), so I
just assumed that it would finish eventually. Apparently not.

After reading a post on Entourage/Exchange problems at MacWindows.com about
a corrupt mail attachment causing similar problems, I'm beginning to wonder
about some corruption in the Calendar. The problem is, how do I find it?
It's not realistic to delete this user's Calendar and recreate it - there
are just too many entries. Is there some means of auto-checking through it
for errors similar to a database repair?

Thanks for any input.

Erich

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

After reading a post on Entourage/Exchange problems at MacWindows.com about
a corrupt mail attachment causing similar problems, I'm beginning to wonder
about some corruption in the Calendar. The problem is, how do I find it?
It's not realistic to delete this user's Calendar and recreate it - there
are just too many entries. Is there some means of auto-checking through it
for errors similar to a database repair?

I've had that before and the solution was... a port-sniffing. I saw it
pretty obviously in the log. Unfortunately, your data is encrypted so
this is out of the question.

I know Outlook 2003 on Windows can be run with some data-validation
options to try and repair these issues. I suspect it can also be done by
the admin on the Server itself. Any chance you could have access to a PC
to try and get Outlook to do this??

Corentin