users are losing connection to the network drive on the file server

[windows 2003 - random d]

hi,

recently, our office users will lose connection to the network file server running windows 2003 server.

when they get the error message saying that the drive is disconnected, the server however is still online and working, users connection to the server can only restored once the server has been re-booted.

the automatic server shutdown service doesnt work on this server, but i works on all other servers. so in order to reboot the server so that the network users will be able to reconnect, i have to physically go to the server and reboot it.

when you try to do the automatic reboot, the server just sits there and hang, it wont reboot.

it happens every few days,and sometimes even every day. the dell engineers have even came out and installed a new motherboard, but still this doesnt help.

and because this is a live server and users are connected all the time, the server needs to be up and accible all the time.

also, when the problem accurs, all network users have the same problem, and they can still access any other server on the network, just not this specific problematic server

can any one please help or assist?

cheers

[Lucky Luciano]

I have absolutely the same problem :-(
I was already checking all planned jobs, done antivirus full scan, made measure of performance, without success. It is occurrence is random, mainly in the morning. Any help appreciated.

[Jonathan Axford]

Hi Guys,

You need to gather as much info about what is going on on the server when the failure occurs.

Go through the event logs etc. You should be able to get an accurate picture of what is going on by looking at what is happening at the same time or just before the server starts to refuse connections.

As it is a Dell server, do you have the open manage tools installed? This can give you an idea of what is going on with the system hardware etc.

It is worth getting as much info as possible before you start to troubleshoot...

Cheers

[Rob Rugg]

I experienced the same issues once with 2 servers. The users would be dropped and could not connect and all that would fix it was a reboot.

The problem turned out to be Symantec Anti-Virus. We had to completely remove it and clean it out of the registry and install the latest version. This corrected the problem for us.

Hope this helps.

[Lucky Luciano]

Hi
looks that it was really Symantec. Now I am running one server, scanned only as client of others and it works without troubles.
(For now)

thanks for advice you saved my sleeping for a while.

LL

[Andreas Behncke]

Hi this problem often occours thru a Virus Scan engine or a Firewall!!!
Stop both Services and try it again.
It´s a classic problem.

[Antony I Louis]

I had the same issue in my office, I came to know its bcs of Symantec 10. version then I removed and installed old version like 9.o just try this it will help you I hope :)