Win 2000 server sbs partially hangs help ASAP

Discussion in 'Software' started by zr79, Dec 14, 2009.

  1. zr79

    zr79 Byte Poster

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    Hi folks, really need help asap.

    I have a win 2000 sbs server i am working on. When i got to it it was completey frozen after clicking logon on the welcome screen etc know i get to it and i didn't really do anything apart from reboot it and i managed to log in but was very slow in doing so, now when i log in it partially freezes up, i can alt-ctl-del and open TM, and from task manager/new task i can open cmd and in fact open any file from new task if i know it's path and click ok, BUT if i click browse in new task then altough it does open the search for files dialog and the dialog freezes. Also the desktop icons never appear(i lie they did once, after about 5 reboots) but usually they don't appear and if i place the cursor over the taskbar then i get the hourglass, so it like locked or something or trying to load but something is blocking it.

    Something is stopping explorer/shell from fully opening/loading.

    The server has not been touched for months, and it's win 2000 so i doubt any auto updates, only thing i can think of is a failing HD or a virus.

    What i tried - because i could open cmd from TM, i used the kill command and killed many PIDs but after a while it would crash TM also.

    Remeber what win98 used to be like, you could use it for a couple of hours and it would start to screw up, not completely freeze up but partially freeze up and just get worse and worse until you could not open anything, i think this was due to memory leaks in 98, maybe the same things here??

    Any ideas?
     
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  2. UKDarkstar
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    UKDarkstar Terabyte Poster

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    Hmmn - pagefile ?

    Hard drive full ?

    Is it Server 2000 or SBS 4.5 (not clear from your post) ?
     
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  3. zr79

    zr79 Byte Poster

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    Wow can't believe i didn't think of the HD being full, very good idea, will check tomorrow, i could have open computer managment from cmd to check this as well -doe.

    As for pagefile, what exactly would i be looking for, you mean it's grown too large and used up all the disk space, or too small, a too small a PF would fit the symptoms exactly actually.

    As for the version on the disk it says, Small business server 2000 sp3.

    The RAM was 512mb, small i know, i think it really point to a memory/capacity problem as you said..

    Any more ideas?
     
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  4. Bluerinse
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    Bluerinse Exabyte Poster

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    How does it perform in *safe mode?

    The symptoms could also be a malware infection :eek:
     
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  5. zr79

    zr79 Byte Poster

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    No all safe modes give a BSOD something to do with ntoskrnl.exe error


    Follow on:-

    So if you have 2 HDs in RAID(not sure if they are in raid 0 or 1) but i think 0 as it shows in windows setup as one disk, i think that how raid 0 shows, so from what i read you cannot unplug a raid 0 setup without losing data and i don't really fancy installing a 3 drive and adding it to the raid, if you can even do that.

    So i thought what i could do is run a boot imaging software cd and take an image of the HD(s), and replace the raid HD's with a single bigger drive and them copy this image onto that new drive.

    Am i going to have problems taking an image of a raid setup or will it just treat it as one drive.

    How would you do it?
     
    Last edited: Dec 14, 2009
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  6. Sparky
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    Sparky Zettabyte Poster Moderator

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    What kind of RAID do you have? Is it software or hardware?

    Also have you tried booting with the network cable unplugged?

    Any particular reason why the server hasnt been touched in months? :blink
     
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  7. zr79

    zr79 Byte Poster

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    I already said i don't know the raid, read above.

    Everything is unplugged.

    Why should you generally need to use the server?
     
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  8. Sparky
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    Sparky Zettabyte Poster Moderator

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    I did, so why do you think its a failing disk in the RAID if you dont know what kinda RAID config you are running? Sometimes the RAID may be running a sync between two disks (if running a mirror for example) and every single time you are rebooting that process is going back to the start again.

    Also if you have a proper hardware RAID controller you can configure it without having to boot into Windows so this means you can check the state of the disks etc.



    Its called server admin... :biggrin

    *Installing windows updates
    *Updating AV
    *Updating device drivers
    *Updating firmware
    *Testing backups (I take it the server is backed up?)
    *Configuring SNMP traps to identify problems.

    All of the above may have helped prevent the problems you are having now.
     
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  9. zr79

    zr79 Byte Poster

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    Low key server.

    I thitnk the HD are full, not damaged, 2nd post, my bad if i led you to think i thought the disks were failing, i just think they are full, so how do i add a new disk.

    I thought maybe take an image of the disk and load that image onto a new bigger single drive.
     
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  10. Sparky
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    If possible it might be best to confirm that before imaging the server just to save yourself the hassle.

    You *might* be able to find out if the hard drive is full from the recovery console.

    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/301645

    Edit: you could even delete some files from here and see if the server boots after that.


    If you image onto one drive (short term fix?) you will probably have to reconfigure the boot.ini to get the OS to boot.

    I would try and find out what the config of the RAID is, I have seen a few SBS boxes with a failing software RAID and it takes hours for the RAID to sync, during that time the server cant really be used. After that I would break the RAID and add a new disk.
     
    Last edited: Dec 14, 2009
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  11. UKDarkstar
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    UKDarkstar Terabyte Poster

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    Probably more like time to replace and/or upgrade the server. Sounds like it's put in it's time :p
     
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  12. nugget
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    As Sparky pointed out you need to be sure of what the RAID config is to start with. During the boot process you can get into the RAID admin console and see the config and status of the RAID. Might have some clues for you in there.

    The hard disk being full will also cause the problems you are seeing, namely a sluggish to no responsive pc/server.
    Is the antivirus from Symantec? If so the program could be corrupt and not deleting the .tmp files it creates, filling the HDD and makes the system non responsive. I've had this happen to me several times and it happens practically overnight. Clear out the .tmp files one day and the next it's full again making the pc unusable.
     
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