Getting Apache started on Vista when port 80 is blocked

Running Microsofts Internet Information Services (IIS) and a SQL Server on the same development box as WAMP can sometimes cause port conflicts resulting in Apache not starting. Suppose – hypothetically speaking – you’ve recently decided to spend some time setting up IIS server and an MS SQL server on a Vista box (Windows Vista Home Premium in my case).  Then later you switch gears and after setting up IIS and MS SQL server you decide to do some Apache and PHP development only to find that Apache is blocked on port 80.

When the apache server fails to start the first thing to do is test port 80 to see what if anything is blocking port 80. You can test port 80 from within WAMP by left Clicking the WAMP icon in the task bar and select Apache->Service->Test Port 80

If you get a message like this:

Your port 80 is actually used by:
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.0

Then Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (IIS) is the culprit.

To get right you’ll need to shutdown the IIS server. To shutdown IIS start by opening the windows control panel and select add remove programs.  You’ll notice a menu on the left of the add remove programs dialogue window with an option “Turn Windows features on or off.”  Click this link and wait a minute or two for the windows features dialogue window to open, be patient it may take awhile for the dialog to load.
Find “Internet Information Services” and disable the IIS server by unckecking corresponding selection box.

Click ok and wait several minutes while windows accepts the change. You may need to restart your computer although I found I did not have to.

If when you test port 80 using WAMP (possibly after following the instructions above) you see the following message:

Your port 80 is actually used by
Server: Microsoft-HTTPAPI/2.0

Then SQL Server Reporting Service is blocking apache and need to be stoped.
To shut down sql server click on the start button -> All Programs -> MS SQL server -> configuration tools -> SQL Server Configuration Manager.  Click on SQL Server Reporting Services (MSSQLSERVER) to highlight it and then click the stop button at the top of the dialog window.

A blog post I found helpful in figuring all this out can be found here: microsoft httpapi/2.0 disabling apache.

With that done you should be able to restart all services in WAMP and go to town.