KB163243 - XFOR: Causes for Event ID 4018 when starting the IMC

Article ID: 163243

Article Last Modified on 10/28/2006

APPLIES TO

Microsoft Exchange Server 4.0 Standard Edition
Microsoft Exchange Server 5.0 Standard Edition
Microsoft Exchange Server 5.5 Standard Edition

This article was previously published under Q163243

SYMPTOMS

When you start the Internet Mail Connector (IMC), you may receive the following error message:

Error 2140: An internal Windows NT error occurred.

The following event is logged in the application event log:

   Event ID: 4018
   Type: Error
   Source: MSExchangeIMC
   Category: Initialization/Termination
   Description:

   Unable to start the Internet Mail Connector service because
   MAPI could not be initialized.

CAUSE

If you receive this error, check the following:

Verify that Mapisvc.inf is located in the proper folder. It should be in the %System Root%\System32 folder.

Verify that the Exchange Service Account has at least change rights on the Mapisvc.inf file in the <systemroot>\System32 folder.

Verify that you have a private information store on that server. For more information, see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
157042 Event ID 4018 if IMC Started Without Private IS
Verify that the CommonName and HomeDSA registry entries are present and valid. They will be listed under:
```
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIMC
   \Parameters
```

For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

147935 XFOR: Behavior of IMC With Invalid Registry Information

186739 Events 4018 and 4116 Starting the Internet Mail Service

Additional query words: mapi32

Keywords: kbprb kbusage KB163243