Network Connections window hangs for about 30 sec in Windows XP

[Athadeus]

Hi, I have an intel D975XBX, and Core2 Duo e6300, and a fresh install of Windows XP Pro (w/ SP2). I updated the bios to v1334 before I did anything else as well. In Windows XP, I installed the lastest Chipset INF updates, then the video card drivers (x1800xt), then the networking driver, then audio. I don't recall if the problem occurred between installing the drivers, and running the windows updates, because I only restarted once or twice between. Then I ran the windows updates, until everything was setup. Now when I start windows, the network connection icon doesn't show up for about 2 minutes. If I try to go to the network connections folder, then the window I tried to go there from hangs, or if I clicked the link from the start menu, nothing shows up for about 30 seconds. However, web pages load right away after starting windows. I think it is probably a crappy driver from Intel, but I was wondering if maybe there is a setting I could change to fix it? Thanks!

 

[Kappo]

If you have a 10/100 switch, set your card to 100 full duplex, or whatever the most your switch can do. If that fixes it, then it is probably the driver version and your switch auto negotiating. Try a different driver or update the firmware in your switch (if you can).

 

[Athadeus]

The mobo supports 10/100/1000Mbit, and the router is a Linksys WRT54G, which runs the wired ports at 100Mbps. The connection connects at 100Mbps, and both green LED's on the back of the motherboard come on, indicating power, and 100Mbps connection (it would be one green, one yellow for 10Mbps). Anyways, I have already decided that it is a stupid Windows problem as usual, because I disabled LAN and firewire in the network connections window, and retried. Same problem, so I uninstalled the drivers for all network connections, restarted, disbled the devices in the BIOS, restarted. Same problem with no network connections present. So unless there is a problem with the LAN chip on the mobo, or openning the Network connections window uses some special part of the processor which is defective, it's windows. I'm going to reformat it now, and give it another try. I will test it thoroughly before applying the security updates this time! Thanks for the help 🙂 And if anyone else would please contribute I would be more pleased!

 

[Talcite]

I have the same setup but i didn't run into that problem when installing my drivers. It sounds like a windows problem because the window hangs when you click on network connections. Try downloading the latest LAN drivers from intel, because that usually helps. And when the window hangs, just goto task manager, end explorer and goto file, new task, and type in explorer. You'll lose the window, but the system will unfreeze.

 

[Athadeus]

I still need to be more specific with the details I see. I had the latest driver from intel v11.0 downloaded from here.
Like I said above, my install order was BIOS v1334, Windows XP Pro w/SP2, Latest Intel Chipset drivers, Latest ATI graphics driver w/o catalyst, that latest Intel network driver mentioned there, the audio driver, then all the security updates.

Also, the system does not actually lock up. If I start windows, and do nothing related to the network connections window, then the icon will appear after about 30-40 seconds and then the network connections window will open dandy fast afterwards. But if I try to open the network connections window before that has happened, then it will not open, and if I attempted to launch it through another window (control panel specifically), then the control panel explorer window hangs for a while before turning into the network connections one. It is pretty messed up, but for now I'm going to reformat and try again with more testing after each step, and hope Intel will have better drivers available in the future, or Microsoft will fix the problem if it is their fault. Thanks!

 

[nova2]

use filemon and regmon from sysinternals -- monitor their output and exclude(filter) any unecessary applications that clog up the log.

they may help you figure out more which may lead you to a fix.

both of these utils have helped me much and continue to do so, I consider them essential.

so while running (eg) regmon, commit the act that will freeze the window, wait until it acts normally, then disable logging for regmon and analyze the output carefully. The more you work with these 2 apps the more routine it gets.

double click an entry in regmon to open it up.

 

[Athadeus]

Sounds like good stuff. Next time I have a problem I will have to try to work it out and learn some new things in the process. At the moment though, the problem is gone after a format and reinstall. Intel also had newer network drivers v11.1 up from v11.0 if perhaps that made a difference. I find that unlikely since uninstalling the drivers, restarting, disbling the firewire and LAN in the BIOS, and restarting didn't fix it. Just MS being weird as usual. No networking devices installed, and it still clunked along. Formatting always seems to fix the problem. Except when I built my last comp and it had a bad P4, which took me 6 months and 10 formats (in a 2 month period) to figure out what it was.

 

[nova2]

curious, what kind of problems were exibited from your defective P4 CPU?

 

[Athadeus]

It was a whole lot of fun. Everything worked great for about a month. The first and most reproducible problem began occurring after a month, which was Warcraft 3 exiting to the desktop randomly between 3 and 30 minutes into most games. I would just get a little box that said "Memory access error: address at 0x000C1FA2 could not be read". Well I just made up the number, and the error code was probably a little different. Then I started getting random restarts. Sometimes it would just restart, and sometimes it would hang on a BSOD, even though I had it set to never restart after error. The blue screens had all kinds of different messages, most commonly IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL, which really threw me off course. First I thought it was Windows, so I did a lot of reinstalling. During all that I was borrowing what parts I could from people that lived in my dorm area, but my parts were fairly high end then, and nobody wanted me to borrow their p4 proc, as that takes a bit of work. So I switched the memory, video card, removed the optical drivers, sound card. Eventually I rmaed the mobo cause I though that was the problem. Finally after the school year was over I really had time to get it fixed. I noticed the problem occurred less frequently with HT off. To get a final verdict on what was bad, I brought it to TranMicro in Minneapolis ($50 diagnosis, but worth it), and asked them to check the processor. It took them a week to get around to it, but that was the problem, so I got Intel to send me a new one and no problems after that.