Skip to content

Juniper DHCP-Service subsystem is not responding

I had an issue where it was reported that all recent client devices connecting to the WLAN are not getting an IP Address, I was able to see that on the WLAN Controller end (this was an Aruba Mobility Controller). I then needed to see what device on the network is providing DHCP, it was our Juniper SRX Firewall. Below are some of the checks I completed to determine what the issue was and to resolve it.

dhcp-service subsystem is not responding

If running any sub command to the dhcp binding results in such error, we will need to restart the DHCP Service.

show dhcp server binding summary
error: the dhcp-service subsystem is not responding to management requests

juni-srx-dhcp-subsystem-not-responding

restart the DHCP service

restart dhcp-service

juni-srx-dhcp-subsystem-not-responding-restart

Junos Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol process started, pid 80252
show dhcp server binding
IP address        Session Id  Hardware address   Expires     State      Interface
172.50.0.122      113         00:52:5a:20:2e:a9  28800       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.2.85       596         00:50:5a:20:2e:85  28798       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.206.157    119590      00:50:5a:20:2e:9b  28798       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.1.75       325         00:50:5a:20:2e:a9  28795       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.2.199      710         00:50:5a:21:2e:03  28796       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.2.84       595         00:50:5a:21:2e:3c  28795       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.0.123      114         00:50:5a:25:2e:75  2324        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.2.90       601         00:50:5a:25:2e:95  3602        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.2.192      703         00:50:5a:25:2e:39  28798       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.151.250    39333       00:50:5a:25:2e:59  28798       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.151.153    39235       00:50:5a:26:2e:0a  28797       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.95     158946      00:50:5a:db:2e:cb  4208        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.58.75      159006      00:50:5a:1d:2e:ee  9902        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.57     158908      02:50:5a:26:2e:19  11479       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.130    158981      02:50:5a:20:2e:24  6981        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.62     158913      02:50:5a:9c:2e:8e  3380        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.101.242    158579      02:50:5a:7d:2e:fc  10641       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.69.96      84222       04:50:5a:14:2e:18  5061        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.102.199    158794      06:50:5a:2e:2e:05  6409        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.104.78     159186      06:50:5a:10:2e:0f  10997       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.98.203     157769      06:50:5a:87:2e:12  10478       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.101.205    158542      06:50:5a:80:2e:b3  9842        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.248    159100      0a:50:5a:3d:2e:4b  8707        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.102.130    158723      0a:50:5a:d3:2e:dd  7852        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.102.81     158674      0a:50:5a:50:2e:33  11358       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.104.92     159200      0c:50:5a:ab:2e:56  11436       BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.103.45     158896      0e:50:5a:d3:2e:91  3300        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.101.87     158422      0e:50:5a:22:2e:c1  9821        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.102.220    158815      0e:50:5a:2e:2e:e1  7713        BOUND      irb.1234
172.50.102.158    158752      10:50:5a:41:2e:34  8363        BOUND      irb.1234

other things to check for when you have DHCP issues

checking arp for the affected vlan, in this example it's vlan 1234

show arp no-resolve | match irb.1234 | count

check if anyone made any changes recently, maybe someone bricked DHCP?

show configuration | compare rollback ?

Possible completions:
0                    2023-10-30 16:59:23 EDT by userx via cli
1                    2023-10-30 16:54:52 EDT by userx via cli
2                    2023-10-26 17:26:49 EDT by usery via cli
3                    2023-10-26 17:26:05 EDT by usery via cli commit confirmed, rollback in 5mins
4                    2023-06-20 14:56:35 EDT by userd via cli
5                    2023-06-20 14:56:01 EDT by userd via cli

checking the address-assignment configuration, from the results find your VLAN and check the subnet, then calculate the number of hosts your subnet has, this is to eliminate DHCP starvation issues.

show configuration | no-more | display set | match address-assignment

checking the number of devices on vlan 1234, this gives an idea if we have any bindings at all or not

show arp no-resolve | match irb.1234 | count
#Count: 129 lines

checking if the client device MAC address actually has no IP binding in the Firewall, this will eliminates issues with the Controller.

show arp no-resolve | match 0c:89:86:d2:1e:3e