Troubleshooting DTC communication through a firewall using RPC

Configure Remote Procedure Call (RPC) to use a limited range of port numbers. Use the following procedure on all cluster nodes and all DMZ or perimeter networking servers that require access across the firewall.

  1. Select Start > Run, type dcomcnfg, and click OK.
  2. Select Component Services > Computers.
  3. Right-click My Computer and select Properties.
  4. On the Default Protocols tab, select Connection-oriented TCP/IP.
  5. Click Properties.
  6. Specify a range of port numbers above 1024 and sufficient for the purposes of the target architecture (for example, 5000 to 5200).
  7. To restart RPC and ensure that it is issuing port numbers in only the specified range, reboot every server on which you made the changes.

Use the range that you set in the firewall policy to permit two-way communication. You also must enable the default EPM port (port 135).

The following Distributed Transaction Coordinator (DTC) tools are useful for testing the communication:

 

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