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How to reinstall MSDTC

Sometimes MSDTC is down and it is impossible to get it running again. You try to reboot the server… but nothing… MSDTC service is down and you can’t run it.
In this situations, the only solution you have is to reinstall the service, but (as you have tested some minutes ago), trying to uninstall and install the service again from IIS not fix the problem. To reinstall MSDTC you have to follow these steps:

 

– Execute these commands from command-line console:

    net stop msdtc
    msdtc -uninstall

– Open system registry and delete these entries:
     [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \SOFTWARE \Microsoft \MSDTC]

     [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \SYSTEM \CurrentControlSet \Services \MSDTC]

– From command-line console again, run these commands:

      msdtc -install
      msdtc -resetlog
      net start msdtc

It is possible that the problems in MSDTC service have corrupted the transaction logs too. In this case, it is better that additionally to the steps to reinstall MSDTC service, you execute the following steps to reset the log-file:

– Go to %SystemRoot%\System32\DTCLog folder (or to the folder where logs are generated if you have changed the default one)

– If exists a Msdtc.log file, rename it to Msdtc.old (MSDCT service has to be stopped)
– Use notepad to create text file named Msdtc.log
– Open command-line console and run this command:
         msdtc -resetlog

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