Windows Event ID 8216 – Kernel-EventTracing: ETW Session Start Failed

Start by examining current ETW session usage to identify potential resource constraints or conflicts.

1. Open an elevated PowerShell session and check active ETW sessions:

Get-EtwTraceSession | Select-Object SessionName, LogFileName, MaximumFileSize, BufferSize | Format-Table -AutoSize

2. Check the total number of active sessions against the system limit:

$sessions = Get-EtwTraceSession
Write-Host "Active ETW Sessions: $($sessions.Count)"
Write-Host "System supports up to 64 concurrent sessions"

3. Identify sessions consuming excessive resources:

Get-EtwTraceSession | Where-Object {$_.BufferSize -gt 1024} | Select-Object SessionName, BufferSize, LogFileName

4. Navigate to Event Viewer → Applications and Services Logs → Microsoft → Windows → Kernel-EventTracing → Admin to review related ETW events and identify the specific session that failed to start.

Corrupted ETW provider registrations can prevent session creation. Verify and repair provider registrations.

1. Check ETW provider registrations in the registry:

Get-ChildItem "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WINEVT\Publishers" | Select-Object Name | Measure-Object

2. Verify specific provider registration integrity:

logman query providers | Select-String "Microsoft-Windows-Kernel"

3. Re-register ETW providers if corruption is detected:

wevtutil el | ForEach-Object {wevtutil gli $_}

4. Check the ETW provider manifest registration:

Get-ItemProperty "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WINEVT\Publishers\*" | Where-Object {$_.PSChildName -like "*Kernel*"}

5. If provider corruption is found, rebuild the ETW provider database by running:

sfc /scannow

ETW session creation requires specific privileges. Identify the requesting process and verify its permissions.

1. Enable process tracking to identify which process is attempting to create the ETW session:

auditpol /set /subcategory:"Process Creation" /success:enable

2. Check the Security log for process creation events around the time of the 8216 event:

Get-WinEvent -FilterHashtable @{LogName='Security'; Id=4688; StartTime=(Get-Date).AddHours(-1)} | Select-Object TimeCreated, @{Name='ProcessName';Expression={$_.Properties[5].Value}}

3. Verify the requesting process has the necessary privileges:

whoami /priv | Select-String "SeSystemProfilePrivilege\|SeDebugPrivilege"

4. Check if the process is running with sufficient elevation by examining the token:

Get-Process | Where-Object {$_.ProcessName -like "*monitoring*" -or $_.ProcessName -like "*trace*"} | Select-Object ProcessName, Id, @{Name='Elevated';Expression={(Get-Process -Id $_.Id).StartInfo.Verb -eq 'runas'}}

5. If the issue is permission-related, ensure monitoring applications are launched with administrative privileges or configure them to run as a service with appropriate permissions.

When ETW sessions become corrupted or conflicted, resetting the ETW infrastructure can resolve persistent issues.

1. Stop all non-essential ETW sessions to clear potential conflicts:

Get-EtwTraceSession | Where-Object {$_.SessionName -notlike "*NT Kernel Logger*" -and $_.SessionName -notlike "*EventLog*"} | Stop-EtwTraceSession

2. Clear the ETW session registry entries for orphaned sessions:

Remove-ItemProperty "HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WMI\Autologger\*" -Name "*" -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue

3. Restart the Windows Event Log service to reinitialize ETW infrastructure:

Restart-Service -Name "EventLog" -Force

4. Verify ETW infrastructure is functioning correctly:

logman create trace TestETW -p Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-General
logman start TestETW
logman stop TestETW
logman delete TestETW

5. Check the System event log to confirm no new 8216 events are generated:

Get-WinEvent -FilterHashtable @{LogName='System'; Id=8216; StartTime=(Get-Date).AddMinutes(-10)} -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue

For persistent issues, perform deep analysis of ETW infrastructure and session creation failures.

1. Enable detailed ETW tracing for the kernel event tracing provider:

logman create trace ETWDiag -p Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-EventTracing -o C:\temp\etwdiag.etl -ets

2. Reproduce the issue that triggers Event ID 8216, then stop the trace:

logman stop ETWDiag -ets

3. Analyze the trace file using Windows Performance Analyzer (WPA) or tracerpt:

tracerpt C:\temp\etwdiag.etl -o C:\temp\etwreport.xml -of XML

4. Examine the ETW session configuration in the registry for anomalies:

Get-ChildItem "HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WMI" -Recurse | Where-Object {$_.Name -like "*AutoLogger*"} | Get-ItemProperty

5. Check for file system issues affecting ETW log files:

Get-ChildItem "C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\WMI" -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Where-Object {$_.Length -eq 0 -or $_.LastWriteTime -lt (Get-Date).AddDays(-30)}

6. If corruption is detected, rebuild the WMI repository which can affect ETW:

winmgmt /salvagerepository
winmgmt /resetrepository