Exchange 2013 Slow

[lholland421]

Hi All, We have been having some issues with our exchange 2013 box lately. When a user tries to load OWA they have to try around 3 times for the page to load otherwise they get "Webpage Unavailable" . This is just to try and load the OWA Login page.

 

Once they have it loaded it runs fine and they can close the browser and reopen and its fine but its the initial loading of the login page. It doesnt matter what browser they are using it happens on both Google chrome and Internet explorer.

 

Anyone else had this before?

 

Thanks

[3s-gtech]

Can you give us some details about your Exchange box? What CU are you on? Our Exchange 2013 box is working well on CU7, no obvious faults with the software itself.

[lholland421]

We are running CU6 with around 1500 mailboxes. The server has 10 cores and 16gb of ram as it seems to love ram! Cheers

[andydis]

do you have 2 seperate servers? A Mailbox server and a Client Access server?

[lholland421]

No One server is running all roles ,Cheers

[andydis]

ok 1 server,

 

new questions

 

whats the OS?

does the owa fail to load on site only or externally only or both?

do you use a proxy server? , do you bypass local address's?

do you NAT OWA to external ip address ? what ports are open?

[lholland421]

Os is Server 2012 R2 Standard

Owa Fails to load site internally. Always seems to load ok externally.

We do use a proxy server ( Smoothwall)

We do bypass local addresses

Pretty sure county NAT OWA and the only port open is 443

[andydis]

Thanks,

this gives us more clues

Owa Fails to load site internally. Always seems to load ok externally.

 

new questions:-

 

What is the browser used to access OWA?

do you access OWA via FQDN or IP or netbios name ?

is it over HTTPS or HTTP?

do you have SSL cert signed?

Do you have forwarding enabling on your DNS?

Do you use VLANS?

 

 

just elimating some possibilities, could be from what you have said

DNS error, networking issue,

Edited March 4, 2015 by andydis

[lholland421]

I have tried both Chrome and internet explorer

I get the issue accessing it using external web address, Ip address and FQDN

Its over HTTPS

We have a signed Cert on the external web address

We do use Vlans

We do have forwarding enabled on our DNS to our Gateway

[andydis]

thanks

 

To confirm: on the LAN you have problems accessing OWA via HTTPS ?

HTTPS working fine from external locations.

 

more questions sorry!

Is your smoothwall your "default gateway" in ipconfig? ( on both client and server) , if not what is?

have you tried using http internally and not HTTPS ? ( to see if you get the same problem)

have you tried unticking all proxy options in IE and going direct via IP?

Does your smoothwall inspect HTTPS?

Does your smoothwall use an upstream proxy?

 

what vlan is the exchange server in?

what vlan is the client in?

does the problem exist accessing OWA from the same VLAN as the exchange server is on?

 

my initial thoughts are smoothwall related.

[lholland421]

No worries , My thoughts are smoothwall related too because if i change disable the proxy it works fine. The default gateway is set to the gateway of that Vlan Depending on which Vlan they are in as they have been done by location. The client and the server are in different Vlans. I have not tried the HTTP option yet but will give it ago shortly. The issue is once the teacher gains access to the email its fine so i have to find someone having the issue.

 

smoothwall is configured to carry out HTTPS inspection and is configured with an upstream proxy. Ill try accessing OWA form the same VLAN and see what happens.

 

 

Thanks for your help.

[andydis]

Thanks , we are surely getting somewhere now!

this statement says it all

because if i change disable the proxy it works fine.

 

So the smoothwall is either trying to forward your FQDN to your external NAT address or something is wrong with the HTTPS inspection.

 

out of interest do you use the smoothwall's "automatic configuration" setting ?

(web proxy > automatic configuration )

 

[lholland421]

Thanks , It is selected for built in and to bypass local addresses although nothing is in the exceptions domain list. Should there be ?

[andydis]

yes please add the FQDN , IP and NETBIOS name of your exchange server,

 

if i was a betting man i am usre this will resolve your problem .

 

if it did, thanks for bearing with the process of elimination and replying! we got there in the end!!!!

[lholland421]

Thanks! Ill see if it works and let you know ! Thanks for your help !

[lholland421]

Thanks for your help but the issue still seems to be there. I am planning on upgrading to CU7 tonight to see if that helps but i doubt it will. Do you have any other suggestions ?

[3s-gtech]

If it's fast without the proxy settings, and slow with them, it'll be the proxy causing it - no doubt. CU7 brings a few changes to the table (alerts work again, the mail list view in OWA is now smaller allowing more on screen etc) but I haven't noticed it being faster.

[lholland421]

Still having the issue. I have another virtual server providing another service the exact same way and it works fine. It must be something to do with exchange as it is now happening when the proxy is ticked or unticked. Any other ideas what this could be. Surely it couldn't be a routing issue if i have another web server setup the same way thats running fine?

[3s-gtech]

It may be worth bringing forward the update to CU7 then, as it may repair the issues you're having (though it probably won't fix the IIS configuration if that is at fault).

[lholland421]

Hi guys , exchange is now quick although on many internal client machines the ssl is not showing. Although externally the Ssl certainly displays all the time. This therefore makes internal initial connections a little slower. Any ideas how I could trouble shoot this Ssl issue ? Would smoothwall strip it for any reason ?