Error with all Windows 2008 R2 assessments - Unknown - Cannot Determine CPU Address Width
I have just installed the latest version of the MAP Tool kit 4.0.2925.0 and whilst I can reliably get good hardware assessment reports for Windows 2008 and Vista, I always get an 'Unknown - Cannot Determine CPU Address Width' error message with Windows 2008 R2 reports in the 'Ready to run Windows Server 2008 R2' column.
Can anyone give me a clue as to why this is?
I am running it on a Vista SP1 laptop and had uninstalled the previous version of MAP.
Regards
Mark
Answers
Hi Mark,
We will not need the backup of your database…
Unfortunately you are encountering a known issue with WMI incorrectly reporting CPU address with those OS. Apparently there is an issue regarding confusing OS CPU and architecture CPU. We are looking into ways to make this less annoying.
Thanks,
Eric
- Proposed As Answer byEric Haberman 1MSFT, ModeratorWednesday, September 09, 2009 6:28 PM
- Marked As Answer byMark H3 Wednesday, September 09, 2009 8:32 PM
All Replies
Hi Mark,
We think we might know why you are having this issue. Can you tell me if all of the machines that are repo’ing this W2k3 x86?Thanks,
Eric
- Hi Eric,
Yes, they are all Windows 2003 x86. A mixture of Standard, Enterprise and R2.
Regards
Mark
P.S. Also could you advise how to upload a copy of that database you requested? Hi Mark,
We will not need the backup of your database…
Unfortunately you are encountering a known issue with WMI incorrectly reporting CPU address with those OS. Apparently there is an issue regarding confusing OS CPU and architecture CPU. We are looking into ways to make this less annoying.
Thanks,
Eric
- Proposed As Answer byEric Haberman 1MSFT, ModeratorWednesday, September 09, 2009 6:28 PM
- Marked As Answer byMark H3 Wednesday, September 09, 2009 8:32 PM
- ok, thanks. I'll keep an eye out for updates.
- I've downloaded the latest Assesment Tool and get the same message.
Such will be the case untill this issue is fixed. I can inform when we do have a download that addresses this issue.
-Eric- Can you inform me as well as I am getting this error too. All my Servers I want to upgrade are windows 2003 r2 standard or enterprise. I wanted to wait to upgrade them when 2008 R2 came out but now I can't use this tool to help me get my funding. Please notify me as soon as a fix is out.
Thanks alot!!
the OCSadmin /Kevin - Apparently...Your server has to be built with Windows Server 2003 x64 edition to report the right CPU Address width.I find this very silly that you can't assess servers correctly unless they're on the x64 build of Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2000.
It is a known limitation with WMI. Our CTP build has some increased logic to detect this situation.
- To provide a little more detail on this: it's not actually a problem with WMI, per se, but with the history of how the x64 architecture came into being and where Windows 2003 / Windows XP were in the develpment cycle when x64 became available.
The x64 design was such that normal x86 applications would just run on x64 with no application changes needed. The x64 chips came into being just about the time that Windows XP was relelased. The 32-bit version of Windows XP and the 32-bit version of Windows 2003 don't have any of the extra instructions supported by x64 to tell if they're running on an x64 chip or not. So when Win XP / Win 2003 interrogate the CPU to find out the 'bitness' of it, they always use the x86 instructions and they're always given a response that says "I'm an x86 CPU that supports x86 programs". Therefore, WMI interrogation of 32-bit versions of those OSes will always respond back that the underlying hardware is x86 even when it might actually be x64.
The only way for MAP to tell if Win XP or Win 2003 32-bit is running on x64 hardware would be to parse the CPU identifcation string and have a reference database that allows it to lookup that string to see if it's the CPU for a x64 or x86 CPU. For example, is "Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU P9500 @ 2.53GHz" a 32-bit or 64-bit processor? No way to know unless you happen to know what a P9500 is. MAP would have to have a list of all CPUs from Intel / AMD that supported x64 with this string in order to know, and the MAP team doesn't have access to such a list.
For Vista and above, this problem is mitigated because the 32-bit versions of Vista actually understand how to interrogate the underlying hardware to see if it's x64, and report that appropriately via WMI.
Thanks,
Jay To provide a little more detail on this: it's not actually a problem with WMI, per se, but with the history of how the x64 architecture came into being and where Windows 2003 / Windows XP were in the develpment cycle when x64 became available.
The x64 design was such that normal x86 applications would just run on x64 with no application changes needed. The x64 chips came into being just about the time that Windows XP was relelased. The 32-bit version of Windows XP and the 32-bit version of Windows 2003 don't have any of the extra instructions supported by x64 to tell if they're running on an x64 chip or not. So when Win XP / Win 2003 interrogate the CPU to find out the 'bitness' of it, they always use the x86 instructions and they're always given a response that says "I'm an x86 CPU that supports x86 programs". Therefore, WMI interrogation of 32-bit versions of those OSes will always respond back that the underlying hardware is x86 even when it might actually be x64.
The only way for MAP to tell if Win XP or Win 2003 32-bit is running on x64 hardware would be to parse the CPU identifcation string and have a reference database that allows it to lookup that string to see if it's the CPU for a x64 or x86 CPU. For example, is "Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU P9500 @ 2.53GHz" a 32-bit or 64-bit processor? No way to know unless you happen to know what a P9500 is. MAP would have to have a list of all CPUs from Intel / AMD that supported x64 with this string in order to know, and the MAP team doesn't have access to such a list.
For Vista and above, this problem is mitigated because the 32-bit versions of Vista actually understand how to interrogate the underlying hardware to see if it's x64, and report that appropriately via WMI.
Thanks,
Jay
Any updates on this yet?- No change.
