VS2013 Professional local 64-bit debugging MSVSMON issue

Question

Every time I attempt to start a local debugging session in VS2013 Professional on a Windows 8 64-bit machine, I receive the following error:

"A 64-bit debugging operation is taking longer than expected. This may be caused by incompatibilities with 3rd party networking software. See help for troubleshooting these issues."

followed shortly by:

"Unable to start program. The Microsoft Visual Studio Debugging Monitor (MSVSMON.EXE) does not appear to be running on the remote computer Please see Help for assistance on configuring remote debugging"

To start the debugging session, I press the "Local Windows Debugger" button:

Nothing scary there: definitely not remote debugging.

Things I've tried:

• Installing the Remote Tools for Visual Studio 2013
• Running these tools whilst attempting to debug.
• Following the instructions on this SO answer.
• Turning off my ZoneAlarm firewall completely (although running MSVSMON.EXE manually does not cause it to ask me for permissions... Is it even running a server?)
• Adding an exception to the Windows Firewall for the monitor
• Setting MSVSMON.EXE to "No Authentication" mode
• Checking my "HOSTS" file: Only comments.
• Restarting

Further symptoms:

• Only happens when debugging 64-bit software.
• Happens no matter what language (C++, C# both have the same issue)

Any help in resolving this would be great.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Installing "Remote Tools for VS 2015" from Microsoft website solved the issue for me.

Found the answer here!

Answer 2

Here at work, we have high claims in firewall and proxy, my solution to this problem was just run as administrator. Hope it helps someone

Answer 3

Try to restart your app_pool. It happens to me quite often on VS2015. I guess I have some projects targeting 32 bit and some targeting 64 bit in my solution, that causes this.

Answer 4

While debugging today got the same error message

A 64-bit debugging operation is taking longer than expected. This may be caused by incompatibilities with 3rd party networking software. See help for troubleshooting these issues.

In my case, just REBOOTING THE COMPUTER solved the problem. I recommend trying this first.

Answer 5

I had this problem when running a VPN and it went away after turning the VPN off. It has something to do with how MS does 64-bit same machine debugging, the network plays a role and VPN interferes. I looked this problem up on the MS site and it was acknowledged as a bug, but I'm guessing not enough of us need this to work for a fix to come along. I just turned my VPN off, not a problem for me. (VS2013)

Answer 6

I had this problem in VS 2015 and fix it by changing IDM settings.

1. Open the IDM(Internet download manager)
2. press Downloads menu.
3. in general tab remove the check on 'Use advanced browser integration'

I hope your problem fix with this solution.use this helpful picture.

Answer 7

Turning off firewall solves the issue. I was working on Visual Studio 2015

Answer 8

Setup: Visual Studio 2013 Community edition with update 5, Windows 7, 64 bit

Problem: Only 64bit debugging not working. Also, only started happening since installing ZoneAlarm firewall and AVG antivirus.

Error Message:

"Microsoft Visual Studio Debugging Monitor (MSVSMON.exe) failed to start. If the problem persists try repairing..."

SOLUTION that worked for me:

My solution was to make the devenv.exe and msvsmon.exe "run as administrators".

Somehow the new firewall / antivirus (was running McAfee before but subscription expired) managed to reduce the rights of my devenv.exe and/or msvsmon.exe

Answer 9

For me the solution posted by Parliament here solved the issue.

Don't understand what's the problem exactly since the url resolves to the local host anyway. Maybe the agent is required for doing that resolution...

The solution posted by chaithanya itself may also solve the problem by installing the Remote Tools for Visual Studio. But I didn't want to give it a change to break the remote abilities I need in Visual Studio Tools for Apache Cordova for iOS apps.

Answer 10

I met the same problem, and Finally make it work:)

I've tried all solution that I can find on the internet, none of them worked for me. (I'm using win7 + vs2013)

I noticed "64bit debugging...", and the problem happens when debugging a 64bit program, Since I'm targeting to x86 anyway, so my solution is:

Project properties -> Build -> "Platform target" switch to "x86".

It worked for me! And you can always switch back to "x64" or "Any CPU" anytime you want.This saved me a lot of time!

Answer 11

I ran into this with Zone Alarm as well. In my case I added an exception for the Visual Studio 12.0 folder in Program Files and another exception for both devenv.exe and msvsmon.exe (in the Remote Debugger\x64 folder) as Trusted Processes. I don't get the Windows message box about the operation taking to long anymore.

I would have commented on an answer higher up but I don't have 50 reputation yet, so this gets a new answer for it.

Answer 12

This setting "Enable 64-bit process for Enhanced protected mode" in Internet Explorer caused my trouble. Silverlight 64 bit cannot be debugged. Turn it off.

Answer 13

If you have IDM (Internet Download Manager) installed, and if you have enabled "Advanced Browser Integration" in it, do disable that "Advanced Browser Integration" feature. It shall solve the problem. It did for me..!!!

Answer 14

You can try also to enable incoming UDP 3702

The windows firewall has a rule described as so:

Inbound rule to allow Visual Studio to discover remote debuggers running on the local network [UDP 3702]

Good Luck

Answer 15

Turning off my ZoneAlarm firewall completely (although running MSVSMON.EXE manually does not cause it to ask me for permissions... Is it even running a server?)

Unfortunately this does not work.

Only uninstalling ZoneAlarm and then rebooting seems to help, at least on my system using Windows 8.1.