nForce 6.39 Ethernet BSOD Issues

[Tanclearas]

First, please forgive me if this has already come up. I took a quick look through, but didn't do a thorough search to see if this has already been discussed.

Last week when I upgraded to the new nForce4 Standalone Kit, I started experiencing the BSOD problems. The new driver worked great for resolving the NCQ problems from the shipping driver, so I didn't really want to ditch it completely. The files reported in the BSOD were related to the ethernet driver, so I re-installed just that driver from the CD that came with the board. Everything has been running great!

Over the last week, while following various threads on BSOD troubles, particularly with respect to the Unreal engine, I noticed people were resolving it by disabling the NX feature (No eXecute, or DEP) in WinXP SP2. I did the same, re-installed the new ethernet driver, and so far everything seems to be fine.

I suspect some UT2K4 players out there never experienced the BSOD problems with the new drivers because they've already done this.

Instructions stolen from here

To disable DEP, perform the following actions:

* Click Start -> Run
* Enter Attrib C:\Boot.ini -r -h -s
* Edit C:\Boot.ini with Notepad
* Under [operating systems] replace the parameter /NoExecute with /Execute
* Save the Boot.ini file
* Click Start -> Run
* Enter Attrib C:\Boot.ini +r +h +s
* Restart your computer

IMPORTANT: Save a copy of your original Boot.ini file as a backup before you make changes!

 

[Glpster]

Alright, that's good to know there is a solution. Thanks.

However, this requires turning off a very nice security feature (DEP), in favor of using these latest ethernet drivers.

So, question is.... Are the improvements of the new ethernet drivers worth turning off the added security of DEP?

Thoughts?

 

[Megatomic]

These drivers pose no problems to my system. NF3-250Gb in WinXP Pro SP2. Must be specific to NF4 somehow....

 

[Tanclearas]

I asked myself the same thing. It's interesting that the Unreal problem is also related to nvidia drivers. nvidia must be doing some odd things in their drivers if they are causing these serious problems with DEP.

I disabled it because I was having another problem related to DEP. The emulator device included with Microsoft's eMbedded VC++ also doesn't like DEP being enabled, and Windows would complain about it every time I started my computer.

 

[Glpster]

Well, I gave it a shot.

I no longer get the BSODs just from the ethernet driver, however I still get them when I install and have turned on, the latest version of the nv Firewall, and then try to access the internet in any way. I didn't try it with the old version of the Firewall and the new ethernet drivers.

I've given up on the nV Firewall for now. It's a great idea, and I was really loving it, UNTIL I discovered that a malicious program could masquerade as a legitimate program (simply by being named the same as a legit program), and the firewall will freely allow it to pass through.

I was hoping the new version of the firewall resolved that issue. But since it STILL BSODs my computer (even with the DEP turned off), I cant test it.

Oh well... I do like ZoneAlarm, but I really liked the idea of getting rid of the firewall overhead that a software solution like ZoneAlarm presents.

 

[PascalT]

nvFirewall messed up my comp as well. Paired up with sp2, it's bad news. I also get BSODs and i am not sure why, it's pretty random. could be my memory.. not sure.

 

[bob661]

You have to turn off the SP2 firewall if you are running ANY other firewall. SP2's firewall seems to be giving everyone problems.

 

[PascalT]

Yep, I did, yet it still caused my problems. eg. my connection would time out. SP 2 as a whole was very bad news for me.. i will stick to sp1. no reason to get sp2.

 

[bob661]

I hear ya. I haven't done SP2 on my machine yet. I did do it on my wife's machine with no issues but in was a fresh image install.

 

[sxr7171]

I don't know, people probably don't want to hear this but IMHO SP2 is the worst thing ever to happen to an otherwise decent Windows OS. It seems to run all sort of extra services and takes away all this control from the user (cannot disable automatic updates etc.). I agree that it is awesome extra security for the novice-intermediate user but it's just too controlling for the power/expert user (which I assume a large portion of AT readers are). I tried SP2 for a week and then just reformatted because of how much I hated it. It also felt slower than SP1.

If anyone thinks it's actually gotten better than SP1 I'd like to hear. Maybe it has matured enough to use now.

 

[PascalT]

sp2 sucks.

 

[Megatomic]

I use SP2 on my system (I beta tested it ) and it runs very well on my systems, both at home and at work. I don't use the NV Firewall as I like my router's firewall, so maybe that's why the latest ethernet drivers don't cause me any trouble.

The only thing about SP2 that I don't like is that it makes it very difficult to install Visual Studio.NET 2003. I left my laptop at SP1a and just run the package on it. It's also behind my firewall so I am not worried about security too much.

 

[taelee1977]

Make sure you have the latest ethernet card drivers. Mine would randomly BSOD and restart on me too. Figured out it was a file related to the ethernet card called nvtcp.sys. After installing the latest nForce 4 ethernet card driver, I haven't had a BSOD since.

 

[taelee1977]

For some reason, the ethernet card driver for the nForce4 standalone uses Ethernet driver 4.68 (WHQL) (which I'm currently using) and the unified nForce drivers uses Ethernet driver 4.42 (WHQL) (which was causing my BSODs).

 

[mulciber]

...

 

[Callesen]

I'm having the excact same problems as mulciberxp. Total stability without NAM installed - and random reboots with it installed.

Cant be much doubt as to where the flaw is.

Would be very nice to hear from nVidia on this issue - Sure dont hope we gotta wait the usual 3-4 month for a new driver pack...

 

[alkolkin]

Well, here I am commenting, better late than never.
I have an A8n-SLI Deluxe with an AMD 4000+ and an Asus en6800 Ultra GPU.
BSOD's everytme I try to go to certain (not all) sites. I even got them sometimes when I accessed another computer on the small home network.
I have the 6.39 WHQL drivers installed.
After studying these comments, I removed the nVidia Firewall and they all stopped. I have a firewall at the entrance to the network and I installed Zone Alarm.
NO MORE PROBLEMS!
The time it takes to try and resolve these BSOD's is FAR longer than the slower response time introduced by Zone Alarm!I will watch for any new drivers released by nViidia, but this solution is flawless.

 

[dark fiber]

I tried to remove the NVIDIA firewall and after I did when it rebooted just before it got to the windows desktop I got a BSOD and it rebooted. It doing that over and over again (BSOD reboot BSOD reboot) until I stopped it and had to run windows xp pro in safe mode. I then reinstalled those drivers and after a few reboots it seemed to get back to normal. Can someone tell me the proper way to uninstall the firewall software?

 

[flachschippe]

Same for Network Access Manager on Windows 2000 (SP4), got random BSODs when trying to access the net.
Uninstalling NAM and using an ordinary SW firewall helped.

Interestingly, the only application that would reproducibly trigger this was Steam.
When steam.exe was updated, or I'd try to run an updated steam.exe, BSOD.
When this happened the first time, my temporary solution was to reinstall the firewall.
When this happened the second time, and the firewall uninstall fixed it, the FW had to go.

 

[digThisXL]

My turn.

Gigabyte K8NF mobo w/ nforce4 chipset.

With 6.39 drivers I get "LAN Cable Disconnected" errors every 2-3 seconds. Then it reconnects. Then disconnects.

Install older drivers from Oct 04 (not sure of ver, can verify) and this causes BSOD. Re-install 6.39, works. Very occasional disconnects but stays connected for the most part.

 

[digThisXL]

Just changed my boot.ini per instructions from OP.
No disconnects so far. Fingers crossed!!!!!

 

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: PascalT
Yep, I did, yet it still caused my problems. eg. my connection would time out. SP 2 as a whole was very bad news for me.. i will stick to sp1. no reason to get sp2.

Yeah, staying with SP1 solves a lot of problems. In fact years from now someone will take an objective historical view of SP2 and call it for what it really is: a bucketload of problems introduced to "fix" an OS that was already working fine.

 

[digThisXL]

Originally posted by: digThisXL
Just changed my boot.ini per instructions from OP.
No disconnects so far. Fingers crossed!!!!!

Found the problem. It was not the boot.ini fix.

My 10/100 Linksys switch does not like the 10/100/1000 NIC built into this Gigabyte board. I am now using a Belkin switch and problem solved.