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My SQL Server Agent service does not start after a reboot of the server to complete installation of KB5071544. Event logg shows ID 7000, stating timeout occured. I tried increasing the tme out to 5 mins but no change.
I am running SQL server 2019 Standard edition and have 4 instances of the SQL Server agents (all using NT Service ). None of these service can start. I have tried checking the version of SQL Agent , checked permission and all seems to be correctly configured. Is this ia known issue. How can i get the SQL agent to start ?
What is the exact error message you see in the event log?
Have you looked in SQLAGENT.OUT in the LOG folder for your SQL Server installation to see if there is anything useful?
And, oh, what does SELECT @@version report?
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I have checked the error and log files but nothing really specifies the exact reason causing SQLAGENT NOT to start.
The error message shown the event viewer is as below
//
The SQLSERVERAGENT service failed to start due to the following error:
The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.
//
@@version shows as below
Microsoft SQL Server 2019 (RTM-CU32-GDR) (KB5068404) - 15.0.4455.2 (X64) Oct 7 2025 21:10:15 Copyright (C) 2019 Microsoft Corporation Standard Edition (64-bit) on Windows Server 2019 Standard 10.0 <X64> (Build 17763: ) (Hypervisor)
Also below is the dump from SQLAGENT.OUT. Does it mean msbd might be corrupted since it shows recovering?
//
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [508] Logging SQL Server Agent messages in file 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL15.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Log\SQLAGENT.OUT'.
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [000] Event Global\sqlserverRecComplete opened
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [100] Microsoft SQLServerAgent version 15.0.4455.2 (X64 unicode retail build) : Process ID 11212
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [495] The SQL Server Agent startup service account is NT Service\SQLSERVERAGENT.
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [393] Waiting for SQL Server to recover database 'msdb'...
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [000]
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [101] SQL Server DXBHRFIN version 15.00.4455 (0 connection limit)
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [102] SQL Server ODBC driver version 17.10.006
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [103] NetLib being used by driver is DBNETLIB; Local host server is DXBHRFIN
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [310] 16 processor(s) and 32426 MB RAM detected
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [339] Local computer is DXBHRFIN running Windows Server 2019 Standard 10.0 (17763)
2025-11-12 17:40:13 - ? [432] There are 7 subsystems in the subsystems cache
2025-11-12 17:40:14 - ? [129] SQLSERVERAGENT starting under Windows NT service control
2025-11-12 17:40:14 - ? [000] InitDefaultMSDBId initialized default msdb id to 4.
2025-11-12 17:40:14 - + [475] Database Mail is not enabled for agent notifications.
2025-11-12 17:40:14 - + [396] An idle CPU condition has not been defined - OnIdle job schedules will have no effect
2025-11-28 08:19:03 - + [000] Request to stop job 360TNA Inbound Interface (from User TNA) refused because the job is not currently running
2025-12-10 17:31:58 - ? [130] SQLSERVERAGENT stopping because of Windows shutdown...
2025-12-10 17:32:00 - ! [359] The local host server is not running
2025-12-10 17:32:00 - ! [359] The local host server is not running
2025-12-10 17:32:00 - ? [098] SQLServerAgent terminated (normally)
//
To add, other SQL services like SQL server, analysis services, CEIP etc are all running fine. Its just the SQL server agent does not start after a restart of the server post installation of Dec 9 server cumulative update KB5071544
That log file is from before you applied the patches, log at the timestamps in the beginning of the log. This means that Agent never came that far that it started to write to the log file.
Here is one more step of troubleshooting: Open a command-line window as administrator, and then move to the BINN folder of your SQL Server installation. With a default installation this would be C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL15.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\BINN.
At the command prompt run
SQLAGENT -i MSSQLSERVER
For reference, when I try this on my machine, I get this error message:
Microsoft (R) SQLServerAgent 15.0.4455.2 Copyright (C) 2019 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. StartServiceCtrlDispatcher failed (error 203). SQLAgent is exiting
This is likely to be due to that I start Agent in this odd way. I can still start Agent from SQL Server Configuration Manager. Thus, I expect that you will get some different output. Hopefully an error message that gives a clue.
Hi,
I ran the below command and got the error as below
SQLAGENT -i MSSQLSERVER
It seems that somehow the ODCB 17 Driver for SQL Server was wiped out. Don't know how that happened, but I don't think it was the KB update as such that did it.
In any case, go here do download and install ODBC 17: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/connect/odbc/download-odbc-driver-for-sql-server?view=sql-server-ver15#version-17
That worked! I reinstalled the ODBC driver 17 for SQL server and then agents started. It got something to do with the KB patch because it is after the restart which was triggered by this patch the ODBC got removed for some reason. It is also strange that other ODBC drivers (18 and above ) did not get removed. Thanks for the support.