Network error (Notes kills my local TCP/IP)

HCL Domino Domino Forum
1

Scenario:Windows XP SP3 client

Connection to Domino 8.01 Server via TCP/IP over IPSec-VPN

(Network allows TCP, UDP and ICMP traffic to the server)

Situation:

  • Notes Client 8.01 freshly installed

Setup procedure (ID, connecting server, etc) was done by using GB-Ethernet.

  • All other communication ports other than TCP/IP are disabled

  • Fresh start of the operating system

  • Connecting to the company’s server via IPSec-VPN

  • Ping to the Domino 8 server = Response OK

  • Starting Notes 8.01 and entering password

  • After a short (>20 sec!) time the "Getting started tab and the “Home” tab opens.

The “Home” tab remains empty.

The status bar tells me "Checking for at last known address .

  • Then, again 20-30 secs later, the window of the “Activity Monitor” pops up, telling me there’s a problem. "An internal error occured during: “Activity Monitor” and “Message processor is null or has not been started”

  • Clicking in this window on “OK” does apparently nothing, the notes client remains dead and can only be killed by the windows task manager.

  • After few minutes of inactivity of the Notes client the “Home” tab fills with the usual default content.

  • Trying to CTRL-Open an application on the server. Result = Server is not accesible

  • Meanwhile the running ping-check in the background shows also that there’s no more response from the Domino server. The responses are stopped right after the “Activity Monitor” window pops up.

Even more, after this occurs the whole network is dead and …

  • I have to restart the machine.

What I’ve overseen in solving this problem? Must admit, I’ve left out R7 and was happy up to R6.5.x with it. Now with R8 this (and some other) issues takes me back in the elementary school of Notes/Domino administration.

What I don’t understand is the fact, that on this windows machine a former installed R6.5 client worked flawlessly with VPN.

I checked again and again the VPN-Access-Server for anything that would prevent communication with the Domino server, but found nothing. I have full access to the internal network.

Does anyone have experienced similar network problems with R8 and maybe a starting point for me to solve this problem?

Cheers

Ralf

2

Subject: Network error problem solved (but root cause in LND8?)

No one else experienced this problem? OK, I think I already found the showstopper:

After extensive testing it looks like that a broadband DSL-Router stopped LN8 from communicating to the Domino server. I replaced at some point the router (a Netgear FWG114Pv2) with a PFsenseV1.2-WRAP (a FreeBSD-based FW) and it works now continiously well. No errors, no hang-ups, no network hick-up on the client machine.

Still I haven’t fiddled out what exactly in the old router is the problem.

The curious thing is:

Starting with the described problem until solving it by using a new router nothing has changed at the Notes client machine. With the old router it stops networking; with the new one it works well. Reproducable.

With the old router and R6, 6.5, and 7 installed on the same machine worked also very well. Since using R6 nothing else has changed in the network setup. Starting with LN8 the described problem occured.

And: If I’m using an IMAP-Client on this machine connecting to the same Domino server by using the same network path all is funtioning well.

So what does LND8 do in a different way by using TCP/IP other than previous versions?