Vista Dialup error 31 A device attached to the system is not funct

[LUllom]

When ever I dial out, I get an error 31 message A device attached to the
system is not functioning. I have tried 4 different modems but they all do
the same thing. The modem dials out but when it tries to check user name and
password it disconnects and says errror 31 -A device attached to the system
is not functioning. I have seen a few other people with this same problem on
the different forrums but no solution. Can you help? I have Vista Ultimate.
with duo core and 1 gb memory.

 

[Daniel Pratt]

Add me to the list of people experiencing this exact problem. I ordered
dial-up service on Sunday (two days ago) and used it without problems the
rest of that day. On Monday, however, any attempt to connect resulted in
error 31. This error occurs after the connection is established, during (or
immediately after) the user name/password validation.

I have a high degree of confidence that this is not a problem with the modem
hardware. According to the log, the modem successfully connects at 53333.
When I turn on the terminal window, I am able to see the user and password
prompts from the remote server.

Between me and the tech person, it seems we tried every permutation of modem
and connection configuration settings. We tried deleting and re-creating the
DUN entry several times. We tried deleting the modem from the device manager
and letting Windows re-install the driver. I downloaded and installed the
latest modem driver from Dell (my laptop is an E1505). Every connection
attempt resulted in error 31.

I was able to connect with the same phone line and connection information
using my work laptop (also running Vista Business).

Thanks for any insight.

Regards,
Daniel

 

[AiLite]

Hi,

I have tried this fix on my Vista Enterprise x64, but still have the same
problem. I deleted / uninstalled all drivers and 3rd party software (Vodafone
VMC Lite) but NO dial-up connection want to work at all. Even trying dial-up
using my phone as modem...

J

 

[jgrobert]

I have been having the exact same problem with AT&T Wireless Tethered
connection on a Thinkpad T60P with a Samsung SGH-A747 phone.

I have four computers and this works find on three of them. These are an
XP, a Vista 32 and a Vista 64 machine.

I have spent hours on the phone to AT&T, I emailed Samsung and they referred
me to AT&T. I googled around and found the solution of RAREPAIR.EXE. Since
this is an old program written for NT, I tried to write the author at MS. The
email bounced.

If it is true that the AT&T Communication Manager can corrupt the RAS code
on uninstall, then we have a real problem than will require MS and AT&T to
talk.

One think I am not sure about is that this Thinkpad T60P actually has the
Verizon EV-DO WAN card installed and the drivers from Lenovo. I have
disabled that in the BIOS and the system does not see it.

If anyone at MS reads these issues, we need help.

If anyone who posted before found a solution, please advise.

Thanks, Jim Robertson

 

[Edwin Floyd]

I'm having the same exact problem with Verizon Wireless tethered connection on an ASUS C90S with a Blackberry 8330 "Curve". The computer is running Vista Ultimate 64-bit and attempting to connect using Verizon VZAccess Manager. The same Blackberry and the same version of VZAccess Manager works fine on another laptop running XP Pro. Verizon support has given up and I'm really reluctant to try RAREPAIR.exe given its age and risk. Has anyone found an official solution yet? Does MS even acknowledge that the problem exists?

 

[jgrobert]

After many hours on the phone to AT&T and trying to get some help from MS (I
was not able to get it elevated to a level where anyone could help me) I took
the AT&T advise and reinstalled Vista Ultimate 64. It works fine now.

The first release of Vista Ultimate 64 was installed on this machine and
then many patches followed from MS with the SP1. I suspect there was a lot
of garbage in there. After the reinstall, the system seams to be working
better in general.

 

[Edwin Floyd]

Well, all I have is the first release DVD, the "OEM" version. I installed it
myself (I'm actually a MS "Partner", which apparently gives me exactly zero
influence with Support) and installed all the patches and SP1 with MS Update.
I suppose I could do it all over again, but it would take forever and I
don't see why the outcome would be any dfferent.

 

[jgrobert]

Was your installation recent or was it like mine a year ago with lots of
applications installed, changed, removed etc. So there was opportunity for
corruption. I was trying to use the DUN with ATT Wireless Cell phone modem.
AT&T wireless folks were very helpful in all four calls and a couple of them
were quite knowledgeable. After going through everything we could think of,
they said I would have to reinstall the OS. They had seen similar things
before and their thinking is that it is caused by corruption to the RAS code
due to uninstalling their Communication Manager.

 

[Edwin Floyd]

I installed Vista on this laptop in March, 2008, then applied all patches,
including SP1. I have since installed a number of applications, but only
removed maybe one or two, not communications-related. I acquired the
Blackberry and installed VZAccess Manager (Verizon's eqv to Communications
Manager) a little over two weeks ago. There was no previous version VZAccess
Manager or any similar product on this machine. It exhibited the Error 31
symptom from the very beginning, before I ever removed and reinstalled it.
FWIW, MS has a Vista system file integrity checker (SFC) which I ran
yesterday and which gave the system a clean bill of health.

Verizon has been as helpful as they know how to be, but they've reached a
dead end - we've demonstrated conclusively that the problem is not with their
software.

Update: I received a follow-up call this morning from Microsoft. The caller
promised to escalate the problem to their "level 3" support team and have a
"Research Technician" contact me real soon now. Hope springs anew...

 

[ScheideTech]

Add me to the list, multiple restore points and several modems later, All
reporting the error 31 after being authenticated on the network. The system
has been running fine for about a year, then didn't. Don't seem to have an
acknowledgement that there is a problem with Vista's dialup handling from
microsoft folks.

 

[Edwin Floyd]

I was able to demonstrate the same error 31 failure with my Vista
installation on three entirely different devices / software - the original
Verizon Blackberry with VZAccess Manager, a Sprint USB dongle with their
connectivity software, and a plain old dial-up modem using Vista's built-in
MS DUN service. I sent and/or posted trace information for the dial-up modem
case since it involves much fewer third-parties. In the end, it all came to
naught; despite absolute proof, MS technical support has yet to acknowledge
that the problem exists.

I have worked with MS Technical Support now on several issues with various
products over the past year or so and I'm beginning to see a pattern. Most
of the technicians seem to really care and try very hard to help. They are
actually rather good at helping you find and deal with a problem as long as
it falls into one of two categories: (a) User error / misunderstanding /
mis-configuration, or (b) third-party product bug / incompatibility. If the
problem truly is (c) a bug within an MS product, they can't help you. They
get stuck in a loop. They will keep running you around in circles trying and
retrying one thing after another to narrow down the problem to something in
(a) or (b), but they have no mechanism to deal with (c). It's as if the
concept of a bug in MS code doesn't exist within their culture or language.
They apparently have no mechanism to escalate to any team within MS that can
deal with an actual MS product bug. (If they do, they never acknowledged it
to me on the two proven "category (c)" problems that I have brought to them.
[The other one was in MS Word.])

So, the foregoing is preface to the fact that I have now resolved the issue
on my laptop. I have abandoned Vista. I downgraded (upgraded?) to XP
Professional, which I occasionally run under VMWare only when needed for some
specific application that won't run under the laptop's primary OS, Ubuntu
8.04 64-bit Linux. (I'm gradually whittling away at those, but in my line of
work, will probably always have a few.) The day after I installed Linux, I
was able to connect to the Internet using my Verizon Blackberry device via
BlueTooth. Connectivity has worked reliably ever since.

I spent many, many, many hours trying to get MS to take this problem
seriously, and they never did. In the end, I ran out of time. I couldn't
afford to be without self-contained connectivity any more when I travel to a
client site. My business was beginning to suffer. I really, really tried to
love Vista. She let me down.

Add me to the list, multiple restore points and several modems later, All
reporting the error 31 after being authenticated on the network. The system
has been running fine for about a year, then didn't. Don't seem to have an
acknowledgement that there is a problem with Vista's dialup handling from
microsoft folks.

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