We can see out to any computer on the network from the server but they can't
see the server...we aren't running a domain with Windows XP Pro (one Windows
2000 system) but we are using a workgroup. There are 8 computers on the 10
user-license.

Everything was working well until we restarted the server after installing
an HP Laser printer. Something must have been changed befoe the restart but
we can't track it down. We are getting an Internet connection and there are
two LAN cards in the server...we run both cables to a managed router and that
router gets the internet from a Linksys VPN router.

We can ping any computer on the network from the server (obviously since we
an access their files) but we can't ping the server from the computers.

Something else that is weird...we went to change the TCP/IP settings on the
server a couple of times and it turned the server off.

All of the service packs are installed and we are not running anything on
the server that didn't come on the WS2003 CD (we uninstalled the printer).

The server is a custom dual Xeon x64 with 4GB RAM and the RAID has been
turned off but it still has four 250GB HDDs. (2 SATA and to IDE (or EIDE or
whatever the newest is). It has ran really well for about a year now. We
are faily certain this is a software error.

Any ideas?

In this sort of case I'd first be inclined to try and find out exactly what
that HP installer did. Was it a straightforward driver, or a setup-program
that installed other (probably unwanted) things along with the driver?

In my experience, Windows never likes situations where two LAN cards have
IPs in the same subnet range, its routing gets confused. (although you can do
this on Linux without probs) However, that shouldn't lead to the server
restarting. The fact that it is suggests a damaged TCP/IP stack, LAN driver,
or perhaps a faulty card. Have you reseated the cards? Obvious but often
overlooked. Maybe one was dislodged when connecting the printer.

-------
Shameless Plug: If you don't want to delve into the complexities of a
domain, but at the same time you'd rather have some degree of logon-security
over the server, then http://mylogon.net could be helpful.

I'm fairly sure it was straight forward. We've checked the server over for
unwanted software...
The TCP/IP connections are on board...not cards.
We'll try the subnet issue again. Are you talking about the gateway or the
IP address...or both?
We finally got the printer software uninstalled and put it on its own
dedicated print server. The server hasn't turned off since.
Is it possible there is a 32 vs 64 error and is there a way to fix this?

Thanks.

"Ian" wrote:

> In this sort of case I'd first be inclined to try and find out exactly what
> that HP installer did. Was it a straightforward driver, or a setup-program
> that installed other (probably unwanted) things along with the driver?
>
> In my experience, Windows never likes situations where two LAN cards have
> IPs in the same subnet range, its routing gets confused. (although you can do
> this on Linux without probs) However, that shouldn't lead to the server
> restarting. The fact that it is suggests a damaged TCP/IP stack, LAN driver,
> or perhaps a faulty card. Have you reseated the cards? Obvious but often
> overlooked. Maybe one was dislodged when connecting the printer.
>
> -------
> Shameless Plug: If you don't want to delve into the complexities of a
> domain, but at the same time you'd rather have some degree of logon-security
> over the server, then http://mylogon.net could be helpful.
>
>