Discovery fails with error The Request Failed with HTTP Status 401: Unauthorized

This article discusses information regarding the following error message that may appear when performing a discovery of any servers in your environment. This error occurs on the PowerConvert Server during the discovery process.

ERROR: The Request Failed with HTTP Status 401: Unauthorized

When performing a discovery the above error appears on the PowerConvert Server. In addition the discovery job will fail at 50 percent.

Solution:1  Confirm IIS and NTFS Permissions on the PlateSpin Server

Step 1: Confirm the IIS and NTFS Permissions are set as stated in KB Q20718

TID 7920718

Solution:2  Modify the System Wide .NET machine.config to include your proxy server 

Step 1: Open My Computer and navigate to <WINDOWS>\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\CONFIG

Step 2: Locate the machine.config file and open it with notepad

Step 3: Add the following lines somewhere within the body of the configuration file

<system.net>
<defaultProxy>
<proxy
usesystemdefault = "false"
/>
</defaultProxy>
</system.net>

Step 4: Restart IIS on the PlateSpin Server.

This will resolve the 401: Unauthorized error message as this changes the system wide .NET 2.0 Configuration to not use the systems default proxy.  This can be an issue if a proxy server requires authentication and the PlateSpin Server is not able to authenticate to the server.