RE: Strange Irregular DNS/Networking Problems

I think I spoke too soon as the problem is still evident although it is
certainly not as bad.
For example I can open and close Firefox a few times but then it will stall
the network after opening it a few times.
This problem has puzzled me for a long time now and I have tried everything
I can think of. I started experiencing it as soon as I upgraded the machines
to Vista but I cannot relate the problem to anything, cannot see any errors
and all machines are fully patched and up to date.

My network is not a complicated set up and only has one domain controller.
I have done the following:
- Changed domain controllers through promoting a new one and demoting an ond
one which was a different model
- Replaced network cards
- Turned off flow control on the network adapter
- Disabled IPV6 (this helped)
- Replaced the router with a netgear business router
- Replaced the two switches with layer 2 managed business netgear ones (they
were the white home netgear ones prior to this)
- Replaced all the cables with new cat 5 cables
- Tested with just one client and the domain controller on the network

I have probably done more troubleshooting as this problem has plagued me for
over a year now.
I added the Windows 7 PC to see if that would suffer from the same issues
and that is actually worse than the Vista PCs (although it can't really be
taken into account obviously)
I just tested it with two logins I had created so it didn't mess up other
roaming profiles.

I would phone Microsoft support if I had any idea what could be causing it
or some error codes to give them but at this stage I still have nothing so
don't think they would really be able to help.
I tried to use Wireshark to analyse the network but don't really understand
it very well.

I tried doing a net stop server after the network stalled as from an article
I found it appeared as if this service could be causing the problem and it
hung when trying to stop the service so I couldn't start or stop it and had
to restart the domain controller.

Thanks for your help with this.
Robin

"Meinolf Weber" wrote:

Hello robinwilson16,

Never heard about this kind of problem with IPv6, but think this is because
it is not used so much until now. Personally i disable IPv6 i not use it
on the NIC's.

Also adding the windows 7 Beta version to a running production environment
is a really bad decision. You should NEVER do it.

I know there where some additional patches for Vista about netwrok speed
and some others but i don't know if they are included in SP1, hopefully yes.

What i heard is that firefox or some other not MS browsers and addons make
problems with DNS resolving after changing DNS servers.

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers
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** Please do NOT email, only reply to Newsgroups
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After reading lots of articles on networking issues with Vista I tried
disabling IPV6 and everything seems to work properly now.

The network is a lot more responsive and doesn't stop working when I
try to
launch certain applications.
The speed of file copies from vista machines is still shockingly slow
(SP1
machines) although not XP machines but apart from that removing IPV6
from the
2008 domain controllers and workstations seems to have fixed the
issue.
As another point when I tried to join a Windows 7 PDC beta machine to
the domain the network would stop working everytime I tried to log in
with a roaming profile but with IPV6 disabled it works as normal.

I'm not sure if the problem is related more with my networking
hardware or Vista's implementation of IPV6 but am just extremely
pleased I have resolved this after many months of frustrating network
problems where nothing "seemed" to be wrong.

What are your thoughts on this?

Thanks
Robin
"robinwilson16" wrote:

Unfortunately the problem is still occuring.
I tried launching Firefox on a client and it stopped the whole
network on
all the machines. Firefox doesn't even load although it shows as
running in
processes.
After resetting the domain controller and booting up things are back
to
normal.
I am trying to copy 8GB of files across the network at the moment and
it is copying at around 260KB which I would feel was too slow if I
was downloading the files from the internet. I get 16Mbits from the
internet.

How do I find out what is causing all these problems?
I tried swapping the switch and unplugging everything apart from the
PC and
the domain controller and tried copying the files again but it made
no
difference.
One switch is 1 gbit and the other is 100 mbits.
I also tried restarting the domain controller and the pc again.
The speed starts at around 5Mbits and then drops gradually to
260kbits. The normal switch is a managed switch and it shows no
errors.

Could the problem be dns related?
When the problem is bad the DFS share actually becomes unobtainable.
Thanks
Robin
"robinwilson16" wrote:

Thanks for the help.
I have made the changes and will let you know if it resolves the
problem.
The easiest way is to try running Firefox! I will wait for the DNS
changes to
propogate first.
I was already using the server for DHCP.

Will let you know how it goes.
Thanks
Robin
"Meinolf Weber" wrote:

Hello robinwilson16,

Yes, let the router only do it's routing job nothing else.
FORWARDERS set on the DNS server. If you use also the router for
DHCP remove it and stop DHCP on the router. This is also better to
run on the server.

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties,
and confers
no rights.
** Please do NOT email, only reply to Newsgroups
** HELP us help YOU!!! http://www.blakjak.demon.co.uk/mul_crss.htm
At the moment the requests get forwarded to the router which then
deals with forwarding the requests on to the ISPs name servers.

Would it be best to remove the router from there and put in the
ISPs name servers instead?

Thanks
Robin
"Meinolf Weber" wrote:
Hello robinwilson16,

The router should not be set there, or do you use it for any DNS
services?

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties,
and
confers
no rights.
** Please do NOT email, only reply to Newsgroups
** HELP us help YOU!!!
http://www.blakjak.demon.co.uk/mul_crss.htm
Sorry the router is in as a forwarder and my previous comment
saying the router was not specified is incorrect.

Robin

"robinwilson16" wrote:

Hello Meinolf

I have double checked the DNS settings and only internal dns
servers
are
being used.
I allow only secure updates
The start of authority is the domain controller
The name server is the domain controller
WINS is not being used
Zone transfers are only allowed to name servers
I do have a TAPI3Directory which I don't normally see on other
domains. What is that used for?
I use TCP/IP V4 for the network and nothing in DNS points to
any
external IPs or addresses or even the router. Is this correct?
Thanks for the help
Robin
"Meinolf Weber" wrote:
Hello robinwilson16,

Make sure that you use only domain internal DNS servers in the
domain and no externals, except as a Forwarder on the DNS
server properties in DNS management console. Do you use
networking over TCP/IP or is it disabled? WINS server?

Best regards

Meinolf Weber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no
warranties,
and
confers
no rights.
** Please do NOT email, only reply to Newsgroups
** HELP us help YOU!!!
http://www.blakjak.demon.co.uk/mul_crss.htm
I forgot to mention that rebooting the domain controller will
fix the problem (until the next time it occurs)




.

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