Resolving "Agent Heartbeat Failed" Due to Time Synchronization Mismatch

Resolving "Agent Heartbeat Failed" Due to Time Synchronization Mismatch

Agent Troubleshooting

Resolving "Agent Heartbeat Failed" Due to Time Synchronization Mismatch

Diagnose and fix heartbeat failures caused by a system clock mismatch between the Cloudmon Agent and the Cloudmon Controller by verifying and correcting NTP synchronization on both systems.

Overview

When the Cloudmon Controller reports the error:

Agent heartbeat failed [1] - The current time of the agent (<agent-ip>) is not in sync with the controller

this indicates a system clock synchronization mismatch between the Cloudmon Agent and the Cloudmon Controller. This is not related to timezone configuration — the Agent and Controller can be in different timezones without any issue. The requirement is that both systems have the correct system time and are synchronized with a valid NTP source.

Resolution Steps

Step 1: Verify NTP synchronization on the Cloudmon Controller

On the Controller machine, run:

timedatectl

Confirm whether NTP synchronization is enabled and active. If it is not enabled, enable it with:

cloudmon set ntp true

Run timedatectl again to confirm that NTP is configured correctly and synchronization is active.

Step 2: Verify NTP synchronization on the Windows Agent machine

On the Agent machine, open Command Prompt as Administrator and run:

w32tm /query /status
w32tm /query /source

Confirm that the Windows Agent is synchronizing with a valid NTP source.

Step 3: Configure NTP synchronization on the Windows Agent (Internet-based NTP)

If connecting to a public NTP server is allowed by your security policy, configure it using either method below.

Using Windows GUI:

  • Open Control Panel → Clock and Region → Date and Time.
  • Open the Internet Time tab and click Change settings.
  • Enable Synchronize with an Internet time server.
  • Enter a server, e.g. time.windows.com or pool.ntp.org.
  • Click Update now and save.

Using Command Prompt (Run as Administrator):

w32tm /config /manualpeerlist:"pool.ntp.org" /syncfromflags:manual /update

net stop w32time
net start w32time

w32tm /resync

w32tm /query /status
w32tm /query /source

Step 4: Configure NTP synchronization using an internal NTP server

If public NTP access is not permitted by your security policy, point the Agent to your internal NTP server instead.

Using Windows GUI:

  • Open Control Panel → Clock and Region → Date and Time.
  • Open the Internet Time tab and click Change settings.
  • Enable Synchronize with an Internet time server.
  • Enter your internal NTP server address, e.g. <internal-ntp-server-ip>.
  • Click Update now and save.

Using Command Prompt (Run as Administrator):

w32tm /config /manualpeerlist:"<internal-ntp-server-ip>" /syncfromflags:manual /update

net stop w32time
net start w32time
w32tm /resync

w32tm /query /status
w32tm /query /source

Final Verification

Once both the Cloudmon Agent and Controller are confirmed to be synchronized with a valid NTP source, restart the Cloudmon Agent service and confirm that heartbeat communication is restored.

If the issue persists after completing the above steps, collect the command outputs from each step and share them with Cloudmon Support for further review.

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