Strange fax problem - black hole on send

[David]

Background:

Had to replace a motherboard and did a repair install of XP pro from a
retail CD that had SP2 slipsteamed in. All went well except the fax would
not send. Setup went fine and the fax printer reports itself as local
online. If a fax is sent it, basically nothing happens. If I hover the mouse
over the fax icon it reports there are 2 items queued, but they never go
out. If I reinstall SP2, everything starts working again, in fact if there
is a fax waiting, it begins to dial out about 2/3s of the way into the SP2
installation. Fine so far, but after a few days the fax in no longer
functional for sending and the only way to fix it is to reinstall SP2 again.
After a few more days, it quits again. Something is getting changed, but I
have no idea what. Has anyone a clue as to what is happening here?

Thanks, David

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Not really.
SP2 seems to have broken the installation routine for XP Fax, but no one
seems to know how to fix it.

In some cases there is no error message during the installation
(distinguishing this from the very common problem where the installation
routine states it cannot find the necessary files). The installation appears
to proceed without error, but when it is over there is no fax printer
apparent and any attempt to send a fax results in the error message "Fax
server information cannot be retrieved. The Fax Wizard will now close." This
problem appears to occur because the security data base is corrupted as
documented here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/884018/EN-US/
Note that this article describes a hotfix that users can obtain that might
fix the problem and that Microsoft does NOT recommend simply running the
Esentutl.exe utility to recover from security database corruption. In
addition, the fax developers have worked on some modifications to the
fxsocm.inf file that might permit installation of the fax service. This is
an unsupported workaround that I can provide offline for use at your own
risk if you provide a valid email address and can accept zip files as
attachments.

 

[David]

Not really.
SP2 seems to have broken the installation routine for XP Fax, but no one
seems to know how to fix it.

In some cases there is no error message during the installation
(distinguishing this from the very common problem where the installation
routine states it cannot find the necessary files). The installation
appears to proceed without error, but when it is over there is no fax
printer apparent and any attempt to send a fax results in the error
message "Fax server information cannot be retrieved. The Fax Wizard will
now close." This problem appears to occur because the security data base
is corrupted as documented here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/884018/EN-US/
Note that this article describes a hotfix that users can obtain that might
fix the problem and that Microsoft does NOT recommend simply running the
Esentutl.exe utility to recover from security database corruption. In
addition, the fax developers have worked on some modifications to the
fxsocm.inf file that might permit installation of the fax service. This is
an unsupported workaround that I can provide offline for use at your own
risk if you provide a valid email address and can accept zip files as
attachments.
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Background:

Had to replace a motherboard and did a repair install of XP pro from a
retail CD that had SP2 slipsteamed in. All went well except the fax would
not send. Setup went fine and the fax printer reports itself as local
online. If a fax is sent it, basically nothing happens. If I hover the
mouse over the fax icon it reports there are 2 items queued, but they
never go out. If I reinstall SP2, everything starts working again, in
fact if there is a fax waiting, it begins to dial out about 2/3s of the
way into the SP2 installation. Fine so far, but after a few days the fax
in no longer functional for sending and the only way to fix it is to
reinstall SP2 again. After a few more days, it quits again. Something is
getting changed, but I have no idea what. Has anyone a clue as to what is
happening here?

Thanks, David

Russ, Thanks for the offer, but the Fax wizard and fax console work just
fine and the install runs perfectly although it did want some files from the
XP CD. I gave it the slipstreamed XP CD. I do not get any error messages -
the fax appears to go, but never triggers the modem. It just seems to sit in
the spooler as described above without error messages so I assume the hotfix
is not applicable here. I would be interested in trying the unsupported work
around, but it doesn't seem related to the install since just re-installing
SP2 fixes it even before the install finishes. This is a really weird one. I
have a hotmail address at xyzpika1999 at hotmailxyz dot com. Remove the xyz.
Thanks David.

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

The next time it stops working, see what the status of the Fax Service is.
Do you have more than one Windows logon account?
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Not really.
SP2 seems to have broken the installation routine for XP Fax, but no one
seems to know how to fix it.

In some cases there is no error message during the installation
(distinguishing this from the very common problem where the installation
routine states it cannot find the necessary files). The installation
appears to proceed without error, but when it is over there is no fax
printer apparent and any attempt to send a fax results in the error
message "Fax server information cannot be retrieved. The Fax Wizard will
now close." This problem appears to occur because the security data base
is corrupted as documented here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/884018/EN-US/
Note that this article describes a hotfix that users can obtain that
might fix the problem and that Microsoft does NOT recommend simply
running the Esentutl.exe utility to recover from security database
corruption. In addition, the fax developers have worked on some
modifications to the fxsocm.inf file that might permit installation of
the fax service. This is an unsupported workaround that I can provide
offline for use at your own risk if you provide a valid email address and
can accept zip files as attachments.
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Background:

Had to replace a motherboard and did a repair install of XP pro from a
retail CD that had SP2 slipsteamed in. All went well except the fax
would not send. Setup went fine and the fax printer reports itself as
local online. If a fax is sent it, basically nothing happens. If I hover
the mouse over the fax icon it reports there are 2 items queued, but
they never go out. If I reinstall SP2, everything starts working again,
in fact if there is a fax waiting, it begins to dial out about 2/3s of
the way into the SP2 installation. Fine so far, but after a few days the
fax in no longer functional for sending and the only way to fix it is to
reinstall SP2 again. After a few more days, it quits again. Something is
getting changed, but I have no idea what. Has anyone a clue as to what
is happening here?

Thanks, David

Russ, Thanks for the offer, but the Fax wizard and fax console work just
fine and the install runs perfectly although it did want some files from
the XP CD. I gave it the slipstreamed XP CD. I do not get any error
messages - the fax appears to go, but never triggers the modem. It just
seems to sit in the spooler as described above without error messages so I
assume the hotfix is not applicable here. I would be interested in trying
the unsupported work around, but it doesn't seem related to the install
since just re-installing SP2 fixes it even before the install finishes.
This is a really weird one. I have a hotmail address at xyzpika1999 at
hotmailxyz dot com. Remove the xyz.
Thanks David.

 

[David]

Russ,

Regarding the Fax black hole problem, I think I have found out what the
problem is. You asked what the console said when the Fax stopped sending. It
said the fax printer is local and online.
I believe the problem is that now, for some reason, installing SP2 creates a
TEMP directory in the root of 'C:' which must have something to do with
faxing. I have deleted this in the past as part of cleanup of my drives. I
have left it there now and the fax still works. If it is deleted, it does
not seem to be recreated by the Fax software and the black hole effect
happens. I will see if things keep working from now on. From your knowledge
of faxing, could this cause the problem I had? The Fax temp folder was
somewhere else in my previous installation. I have an environment variable
that sets TMP and TEMP to another drive, but the fax does not seem to honor
that now.

David

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Actually I asked what the status of the Fax Service is. You would check that
in Administrative Tools > Services.
I've seen no one encounter the behavior you describe. I doubt a Temp folder
has anything to do with it. Most random failures of the fax service I've
seen seem to be the result of firewall or antivirus software, especially if
the software involved is from Symantec.

 

[David]

Actually I asked what the status of the Fax Service is. You would check
that in Administrative Tools > Services.
I've seen no one encounter the behavior you describe. I doubt a Temp
folder has anything to do with it. Most random failures of the fax service
I've seen seem to be the result of firewall or antivirus software,
especially if the software involved is from Symantec.

Russ,
Something for the text book. On the black hole faxing problem, I went into
the root of 'C:' and renamed the TEMP folder to notTEMP and launched a fax
send. As in the past when I had this problem, nothing happened. I left the
fax queued up (as indicated as "2 documents ready" in the fax and printers
screen) and then immediately renamed notTEMP back to TEMP and sure enough,
the fax began to go out. I guess TEMP is a permanent addition to the C
partition now. The only major thing that changed when I replaced the
Motherboard is I now have a hyperthreading processor. Maybe TEMP has to be
in 'C:' now for that reason, but who knows.

David

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

There are no other similar reports, so we may not put it in the textbook
just yet.

 

[David]

Russ,

Well, it turns out the system environment variable for TEMP was somehow set
to %systemdrive%/TEMP. I have no idea how that happened, but deleting the
TEMP folder in %systemdrive% which is c: in my case, effectively kills the
fax send. I suppose deleting it in username/local settings which is where it
should be would do the same. Now that can go in the textbook.

David

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Does it still seem to you as if this is related to SP2? I would imagine this
would have affected more operations than just fax, don't you think?

 

[David]

Does it still seem to you as if this is related to SP2? I would imagine
this would have affected more operations than just fax, don't you think?
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Russ,

Well, it turns out the system environment variable for TEMP was somehow
set to %systemdrive%/TEMP. I have no idea how that happened, but deleting
the TEMP folder in %systemdrive% which is c: in my case, effectively
kills the fax send. I suppose deleting it in username/local settings
which is where it should be would do the same. Now that can go in the
textbook.

David

Russ,

I have user environment variables for my login that override TMP and TEMP
and those and are what most applications seem to use. Those were intact and
a set command confirms that. The fax seems to use the system values rather
than my values for these variables and the system values are what changed. I
do not think this is an SP2 issue since when I installed SP2 I had no fax
problems. It was probably some bizarre combination of things related to a
repair install using a slipstreamed SP2 CD after a motherboard change. I am
not sure the case could ever be reproduced. I am leaving well enough alone
for now and not going to try to delete TEMP from the username\local settings
folder. You may want to experiment however.

David

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Not I. I never experiment with fax. I can barely ever get it to work, and
when I do, I leave it the heck alone.
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Does it still seem to you as if this is related to SP2? I would imagine
this would have affected more operations than just fax, don't you think?
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Russ,

Well, it turns out the system environment variable for TEMP was somehow
set to %systemdrive%/TEMP. I have no idea how that happened, but
deleting the TEMP folder in %systemdrive% which is c: in my case,
effectively kills the fax send. I suppose deleting it in username/local
settings which is where it should be would do the same. Now that can go
in the textbook.

David

Russ,

I have user environment variables for my login that override TMP and TEMP
and those and are what most applications seem to use. Those were intact
and a set command confirms that. The fax seems to use the system values
rather than my values for these variables and the system values are what
changed. I do not think this is an SP2 issue since when I installed SP2 I
had no fax problems. It was probably some bizarre combination of things
related to a repair install using a slipstreamed SP2 CD after a
motherboard change. I am not sure the case could ever be reproduced. I am
leaving well enough alone for now and not going to try to delete TEMP from
the username\local settings folder. You may want to experiment however.

David