Problem losing connection to networked drives

[deintinis]

We have a problem where people running Win98 will be working on our P:/projects drive which is networked to our Win2000 server and suddenly lose their connection. When they try to access the P:/ drive, periodically it will say that the network drive is not accessible. The only way to reconnect to the networked drive is to reboot their machine. We had our server put in by a third party. Is there anyway that they could not have provided a correct number of licenses and this may be causing the problem. I am really running out of things to try. Any help would be extremely appreciated!

 

[norristechs]

Even if you loose connection to a share, windows will try to connect again as the shares are chached. There is a chance however that the 'third party' that installed your W2k server hasnt setup the number of seats per server correctly, but this too wouldnt just disconnect shares. This appears to be more of a network problem. Can you share files/printers on Win98 systems without problem? Do you have a Win2k admin on site to work this out ?
Are you running IPX/SPX or IP both? Wins DNS? etc

Good luck.
- JD

 

[ama299]

I know that if you go to windows update there is an up for win98 losing connection for shared folers. This may not fix it, because of the many other possiable problems.

 

[deintinis]

We are able to share a printer hooked up through one of the users machines as well as another printer hooked directly up to the network. We use TCP/IP and DHCP. I only have basic knowledge of network structures, and am not sure where else to troubleshoot. We do not have a dedicated IT systems engineer, as we are just a small company. I think it is hard to diagnose because I have not found a rhyme or reason to the timing of why they disconnect. I have removed the Net/Bui protocol from the machines and have downloaded all the needed updates from the Microsoft site. We normally do not share folders between machines, but when I do, I do not have a problem. We have a network switch with only about 14-16 computers at any one time, so I do not think it is the switch. Although at this point, I am willing to take any suggestions to correct this problem.

 

[ama299]

Do you know if the switch is managed or not. Better yet what kind is it. Name model 10 or 100.

How long are these computers connected before they lose their connection. This is very important to know because win2000 server has something called autodisconnect. It will disconnect if left idle.

Intill you get this thing worked out. When the share has a red x thourgh it try clicking on about 5 times or so most of the time it should connect again.

 

[skhope]

I have exactly this same problem, where can i get the update from ?

 

[ama299]

Go to IE, Tools, and then windows update.

Have a nice day

 

[Guest_imported]

Check the DNS configuration on Win98 PCs. Is the primary DNS pointed to W2000 server and 2nd pointed to ISP? If this is the case, remove 2nd DNS.

 

[deintinis]

The switch is a 3com Super Stack II 100. It is 24 port, and like I said earlier, we only are using around 15 of the ports.

I am not sure how long the computers are connected until this happens, but I would like to know more about the auto disconnect. I still have not pinpointed a series of events that cause this error, as it only happens once or twice a day on each machine running Win98. I did have a suspicion that if may have happened after the user stopped working on their file and started surfing the web. When coming back to save or access another file of the network drive, they then recieved the error message saying that the network drive was inaccessible...retry or cancel.

Under the DNS configuration for TCP/IP, the enable DNS box is checked, and the Host box says "comp1". I am not sure what this comp1 is or where it came from.

Thanks for the tips so far. Would anyone suggest that I have each user keep a log of when this happens and include what programs they had open and how long they have been idle, etc.

 

[ama299]

Here try this

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q138365

Hope this helps

 

[dpsmith]

i had a similar problem on my network.
my W2K server had a license problem.
make sure your set up as "per seat" not "per server".
i wasn't and every time we maxed out several people got disconnected.
this would explain why your people can still print off a PC but lose the connection to the server.
check the event viewer for any "out of license" comments.

 

[deintinis]

Where do you check to see if it is set up per seat or per server. I did check the event viewer and found some messages pertaining to the licenses.

I have also changed a configuration on one of the machines. Under the DNS configuration tab, I entered the server IP address in the DNS search order box. I was going to wait to see if this helped any.

I am also going to have the users enter a log of events to figure out if it is caused by the same type of activity each time it disconnects, or if it happens after a certain amount of time, or if it happens when everyone is on the network at the same time.

Thanks so much to everyone who has been offering advice. Any other tips or advice that may help is always welcomed. Thanks again!

 

[deintinis]

I checked, and we are per seat. I straightened out the licensing also. We just had the problem happen again. He had a file open from our networked drive. He closed it and starting using Outlook to send some e-mails. When he went back to Windows explorer and tried to click on the mapped network drive to our server, it gave him the error box "This drive is inaccessible" Retry or Cancel
I tried clicking retry a number of times to no avail. The icon on Windows explorer does not show the red X through the drive like I had thought. It looks like it is working properly, but when you click on it, you get the same message you would if you had been clicking on a floppy or CD drive with no disks inside.

The user that this happened to seems to think it has something to do with Windows explorer. He says any time he leaves it open for longer periods of time and goes back in to get a file off of the server, it gives him the error message. Is there any other 'time out' issues I should be looking at?

 

[ama299]

Have you tried this command
net config server /autodisconnect:-1
You can just do a cut & paste to your run line
This should disable Autodisconnect if this the problem.

Next time someone does disconnect go to my computer and look at the drives in there for the Red X, because I don't think that it will display the Red x in Explorer.

I don't know that for a fact, but it just seems that way.

Don't worry we will get this thing figured out.

 

[dmull]

This behavior can occur because both Windows NT Server version 4.0 and Windows
2000 Server can drop idle connections after a specified time-out period, which
by default is 15 minutes, so that server resources are not wasted on unused
sessions. The connection can be re-established very quickly at a later time, if
required.

RESOLUTION
==========

To resolve this behavior, use a command to change the default time-out period on
the Windows NT Server 4.0 or Windows 2000 Server: At a command prompt, type:
"net config server /autodisconnect:30" (without the quotation marks).

The valid value range to configure this setting from a command line is from -1
through 65,535 minutes. To disable Autodisconnect, set it to -1.

NOTE: This step must not be confused with the remote access Autodisconnect
parameter that is turned off if you set it to a value of zero (0).

If you set Autodisconnect to zero (0), this setting is not turned off and after a
few seconds of idle time very fast disconnections can occur.

For additional information about increasing the default time-out period, click
the article numbers below to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q138365 How the Autodisconnect Works in Windows NT

 

[deintinis]

Thank you ama299 and all others who have helped. I am still crossing my fingers, but I have not had anyone get disconnected so far since I made the change to the autodisconnect feature.

Thanks again!!