Warnings received on upgrade

  • Article

Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1

When you upgrade a server with IIS installed to Windows Server 2003 with IIS 6.0, you may receive the following warning messages:

The following items are not compatible with Windows. If you continue, you may not be able to use these items, even after Setup is complete.

  • IIS World Wide Web Publishing Service (W3SVC) will be disabled during upgrade.

  • IIS is being installed on a FAT volume. This will disable IIS security features.

The first message occurs when you upgrade a server without previously running the IIS Lockdown Tool or configuring the RetainW3SVCStatus registry entry. By default, because of increased security measures, the World Wide Web Publishing Service (WWW service) is not enabled after you upgrade from the Windows 2000 Server family with IIS 5.0 unless you take one of the following actions on a manual or unattended upgrade:

  • Run the IIS Lockdown Tool on the computer that is running Windows 2000 Server before you start the upgrade process. The IIS Lockdown Tool reduces the attack surface of your server by disabling unnecessary features, and the tool provides the option to enable and customize features for your site. For more information about the IIS Lockdown Tool, see IIS Lockdown Tool 2.1.

    Important

    If you do not run the IIS Lockdown Tool, after the upgrade is complete, you must ensure that all unnecessary IIS features have been removed or disabled. You must also ensure that the enabled features are configured with the highest security settings that your organization can support.

  • Add the RetainW3SVCStatus registry entry to the registry prior to upgrading.

  • Add the ?DisableWebServiceOnUpgrade = False? entry to the [InternetServer] section of an unattended installation script that you plan to run for the upgrade.

  • Enable the WWW service after the upgrade is completed.

    Warning

    Incorrectly editing the registry might severely damage your system. Before making changes to the registry, you should back up any valued data on the computer.

Procedures

To use regedit.exe to add the RetainW3SVCStatus registry entry to the registry

  1. Click Start, click Run, type

regedit

in the Run box, and then click OK.

  1. Navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\W3SVC registry entry.

  2. Click to select the registry entry, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click Key.

  3. Type

RetainW3SVCStatus

and then click Enter.

  1. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.

  2. Type

do_not_disable

and then click Enter.

  1. On the Edit menu, click Modify.

  2. Type

1

and then click Enter.

To enable the WWW service after upgrading

  1. Click Start, click Administrative Tools, and then click Services.

  2. Right-click World Wide Web Publishing and then click Properties.

  3. Click the General tab, set Startup type to Automatic, and then click Apply.

  4. Click Start to start the service, and then click OK after the service has started.

The second message occurs when the partition on which you are installing IIS 6.0 is formatted as FAT. Installing IIS on a FAT volume disables Windows Server 2003 security features that require the NTFS file system. For example, NTFS supports Active Directory, which is necessary for domains, user accounts, and other important security features. You should convert the partition from FAT to NTFS before continuing the upgrade.