Exchange Server component Mailbox role: Mailbox service failed.

The short version of this story is READ THE LOGS!  Now here's the long version.

I was trying to install Exchange 2013 in my lab environment and kept running into this error consistently. I scoured the Internet and tried everything that was suggested for anything even similar, with no success. At one point I even scrapped the VM and built a new Server 2012R2 VM from scratch, and the same thing happened. The Exchange setup wizard would fail at about 97% into the Mailbox role installation with the following output. It's not all here, because its ultimately wasn't of much use.

Contacting server and signing in...

Apparently Office 365 has this neat feature where your password expires but it doesn't want you to know. This morning I logged into my computer, grabbed my first cup of coffee of the day and sat down.  About 30 minutes later I got an email informing me that I was not signed into Lync.  And sure enough, the client is sitting there still saying "Contacting server and signing in..."

Free CCNA Resources 2.0

Do you want to become a CCNA with little or no cost out of pocket beyond taking the exam(s)? Between my own attempt at the CCNA and my association with forums and blogs where we eat, sleep and breathe Cisco networking, I have collected a number of free resources that I have collected together here in once place in hopes that it will be of help. I'll try to keep this list up to date as I find new material. Feel free to add a link in the comments or let me know if a link no longer works. Most importantly, PLEASE let me know if I was fooled and listed something here that is less than reputable. Happy Studying!

The exam hasn't changed real drastically from the 640-802 version, some tweaks but nothing drastic. So don't be scared away from anything written specifically to that exam.

Networking on Alienvault as a HyperV Guest

The information here was compiled while using Alienvault 4.6 and I know that 4.3 required the same steps. If you're using a different version, you may need to take different or additional steps. If you're using a newer version, perhaps this is all sorted out already.