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Service Hints & Tips

Document ID: VLAR-465N99

Windows NT hangs with blue screen when used with any Token-Ring card

Applicable to: World-Wide

Symptoms:

• Windows NT (Server or Workstation) will hang with a blue screen, usually pointing either to the NT kernel or the NWLINK.SYS module.
• Packet sniffer does not show anything out of the ordinary before or after the blue screen occurs.

Configuration:

• Any Token-Ring Adapter from any vendor.
• System running Windows NT 4.0 Workstation or Server (up to and including Service Pack 3).
• Using NDIS4.0 Miniport driver (NDIS3.1 miniports do not exhibit this problem).
• Have NWLINK.SYS (NWLink IPX/SPX-compatible protocol) bound to the driver.
• Using the NWLINK.SYS protocol to communicate with another workstation or server on the network.
• Traffic on the LAN segment.

Fix:
IBM has opened a formal service request (SRX) with Microsoft requesting Microsoft's assistance to determine the root cause of the above symptom. Microsoft has acknowledged the problem, and Microsoft customers registered with Microsoft's on-line support can refer to Microsoft Knowledge Base Article Q188414 (direct link: http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q188/4/14.asp) for more information from Microsoft. According to that Microsoft Knowledge Base Article, this symptom has been corrected in Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 4. In addition, IBM has tested Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 and cannot reproduce this problem.

An alternative to installing Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 4 is to back off to the NDIS3.1 miniport drivers. The NT INF files shipped with the March 1998 and later releases of the device driver, queries the target environment and automatically decides whether to install NDIS4 or NDIS3.1 miniports (whichever is the "latest" one the target operating system can support). In order to force the NDIS3.1 miniport driver to be installed instead of the NDIS4.0 miniport driver, the OEMSETUP.INF in the root directory of the NDIS drivers diskette must be modified as follows:

1. Look for the following section in the OEMSETUP.INF file (only applies to the INF files shipped with the March 1998 and later releases)
2. Follow the instructions in the first 4 lines:

; Uncomment the appropriate lines below if you want to install
; a certain NDIS level driver REGARDLESS of the INF's detection
; of the Operating System. This can be useful if you want to
; mandate use of the NDIS 3.1 miniport.

ForceNDIS = "NO" ; the default, comment out if forcing
; ForceNDIS = $(NDIS3_Level) ; force use of NDIS 3.1
; ForceNDIS = $(NDIS4_Level) ; force use of NDIS 4.0

Additionally ensure that you are using the latest microcode level and driver for the affected IBM Token-Ring adapter. You can obtain this by connecting to http://www.networking.ibm.com/support and select the appropriate Token-Ring adapter.

This should work; however, we have received some feedback that there may still be some problems with this configuration. More information can be obtained from the Microsoft Knowledge Base Article Q214624 (direct link: http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q214/6/24.asp).

Please follow the instructions given in the Microsoft articles.

The installation steps for solving this problem are:

1. Install Service Pack 4 (direct download link http://support.microsoft.com/support/ntserver/content/servicepacks/) for Windows NT 4.0
2. Install the hot fix per the Microsoft article Q214624 (direct link: http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q214/6/24.asp)

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	Hint Category	Windows NT
	Date Created	19-03-99
	Last Updated	02-04-99
	Revision Date	30-03-2000
	Brand	IBM IntelliStation, IBM Network Station, IBM Options, IBM PC, IBM PC Server, IBM ThinkPad
	Product Family	All
	Machine Type	All
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