Intermittent SQL Server does not exist or access

[roxy636]

ASP.NET application with intermittent returns of 503 errors with the
following message:
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException: SQL Server does not exist or access
denied. SQL Server does not exist or access denied.

An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the
current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of
the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.

Servers running Windows 2003 SQL 2000. This has been a problem for a
long time (less than .3% of the time). No code changes have been made.
The only changes was Windows SP1 and post SP patches on all servers.
The patching may have made this issue more pronounced.

Any suggestions from the experts?


Thanks,
Roxanne

 

[Greg Burns]

Do you have a processor license, or a fixed number of cals? Are you running
out of connections?

 

[roxy636]

Everything is licensed and there are no licensing warnings or errors in
the eventlogs? The site load follows the workday, and these events
happen at very low traffic times as well as busy ones.

We get these errors in "bursts" lasting 5-20 seconds, impacting all of
the web servers. Makes me think the issue originates with SQL.

Roxanne

 

[Mark Rae]

We get these errors in "bursts" lasting 5-20 seconds, impacting all of
the web servers. Makes me think the issue originates with SQL.

Unlikely - if I were you, the first thing I'd check would be networking
hardware - cabling, routers, switches, hubs etc...

 

[alorent_z]

Search no further....

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;328476

Note, this answer took forever to find so I'm posting everywhere...