We use Windows 2000 computers. In the event viewer I received the message: "Error: Perfnet -- Unable to open the server service. Server performance data will not be returned. Error code returned is in data DWORD 0."

The app "pcanywhere" and app "symposium" (which checks how many calls we have) are working. I formatted and reinstalled but there have been no changes and I get the same error. Do you have any idea what this is? I added a value in the registry that I found in the Microsoft database, but no changes.

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This is not a fatal error, merely a diagnostic one. The error simply indicates that the Server service is not running and is not going to be polled for performance counters. This isn't a problem unless you're retrieving performance information for the Server service, so this error can usually be ignored.

One common reason it shows up is if the File and Print Services for Microsoft Networks component is not present. Another is if the performance counters for the Server service are not correctly installed; it may be possible to fix that by issuing the following commands:
winmgmt /clearadap
winmgmt /resyncperf -p304

This was first published in March 2005

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