Wireless and Generic Host Service failure making me crazy,

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jsteele · #1 Post by **jsteele** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 6:02 pm

About a month ago --- right about the time I installed IE7 incidently --- I started having the strangest problem with the wireless on my T42p.

I have a T42p with a Wireless 802.11abg Lan Adapter II under Windows XP SP2 and Access Connections 4.21. Out of a clear blue sky when I restarted Windows the wireless would not come up. I can occasionally get it to start if I restart Windows a few time, but usually not.

The only way I can get wireless back is to use Windows Checkpoint to restore to a previous checkpoint. And it doesn't have to be a specific checkpoint or a checkpoint prior to some software installation, just about any prior system checkpoint is usually enough: yesterday, the day before, whatever and the wireless starts successfully.

I have tried everything I can think of that might be even remotely involved mostly removing software that was installed at about the time the problem began:
- removed IE7
- removed my McAfee anti-Virus
- removed my Platinum Registry software
- removed AC 4.21 and fell back to AC 4.12

And if this isn't irritating enough, about every third/fourth time I restart Windows I get an error in the Generic Windows Host Service with a module ID of NTDLL.DLL. The windows interface stops responding and it requires a manual power off/on after which the system starts fine until the next time this happens or the wireless fails to start.

All of this started about a month ago.

Maddening.

Musti · #2 Post by **Musti** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 6:34 pm

Hiya

Go to services by
Start --> Run --> services.msc (ENTER)
scroll to WebClient service, doubleclick
Change Startup type to Disabled, reboot your computer.

Still having the problem? Please report back.

jsteele · #3 Post by **jsteele** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 6:48 pm

Thanks, but before I change it what does this do?

#4 Post by **Kyocera** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 7:02 pm

Go to the services, any way you can get there, you can also go through control panel, administrative tool, services, and scroll down to Web Client, click on it and you'll see a description on the left of what it does. Mine is set to automatic so I'm not really sure what shutting it down will accomplish, but you can always restart the service by clicking it again, it's really not a huge deal.

Enables Windows-based programs to create, access, and modify Internet-based files. If this service is stopped, these functions will not be available. If this service is disabled, any services that explicitly depend on it will fail to start.

Purcy · #5 Post by **Purcy** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 7:12 pm

I wish you much luck solving your problem. I personally have heard from so many people having problems with IE7. I myself use FF2 and have not upgraded to IE7 yet (not sure I want to since I don't use it)

jsteele · #6 Post by **jsteele** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 8:18 pm

1. Set Webclient to disabled and rebooted. Came up without wireless again and with the Generic Host Processor error in NTDLL.DLL. Restored to previous system checkpoint and rebooted but still no wireless and with the Generic error again. Power cycled and came up in Safe Mode, restored to Checkpoint of Dec 1, 2006 and system came up with wireless working and no Generic error. But the Registry First Aid did complain of an error in the language files. Tried to uninstall but it complained that uninstall.dat was missing. Reinstalled Registry First Aid and uninstalled it. Took a manual checkpoint.

Bottom line the webclient made no difference one way or the other. Wireless is now running but my config is back to Dec 1 so now I have to fix my desktop. Registry First Aid is uninstalled but ClamWin antiVirus is working.

2. Purcy - I don't know that it was related to IE 7 but it might be, emphasis might. IE 7 was removed two weeks ago and this stuff is still happening. Now I can't go back to IE 6 because there is some remnant of IE 7 that prevents a back version (IE 6) from installing. So I have whatever IE is left behind by the removal of IE 7 --- it looks like IE 6 but it is prone to crash for no reason, I can't go back and I'm reluctant to go forward.

If I reboot now there is a better than even chance that the wireless will not be running when it comes back up and require yet another restore back tro December 1 and a repeat of the install/uninstall nonsense with RFA.

Ah, Windows, never a dull moment.

Purcy · #7 Post by **Purcy** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 8:47 pm

I may be comletely wrong here, but I remember dealing with something with that NTDLL.DLL from my PC days. I remember it being related to security issues. Good luck.

#8 Post by **tomh009** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 9:29 pm

jsteele wrote:1. Set Webclient to disabled and rebooted. Came up without wireless again and with the Generic Host Processor error in NTDLL.DLL.

How about this one?
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/894391

The generic host processor error is definitely unusual ...

jsteele · #9 Post by **jsteele** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 9:37 pm

tomh

Thanks, I didn't see that hotfix peviously. I currently have autoinstall disabled becacuase I've been concerned that one of the automatic updates may have started this problem a few weeks back. so I've got it turned off for a while.

I've downloaded the Hotfix and I'll install it and see what happens.

Thanks. again.

jsteele · #10 Post by **jsteele** » Wed Dec 06, 2006 6:30 pm

It looks like I finally got rid of the Generic Host Process failure after 6 or 8 installs of the Hotfix and reboots. Every time I got the Hotfix applied and rebooted when I came back up the wireless was not running so I had to go back to an earlier checkpoint, restart, reinstall the Hotfix, reboot. I went through this cycle a half dozen times before the wireless came up after the reboot and I didn't have to go to a previous checkpoint and thus loose the Hotfix!

More about the wireless in the next post

jsteele · #11 Post by **jsteele** » Wed Dec 06, 2006 6:38 pm

The wireless failure after reboot is still with me and nothing I do seems to make any difference.

I've removed/reinstalled Access Connections and that made no difference. I tried removing AC and then removing the 802.11abg drivers --- now THAT was fun. I tried to remove through the Add/Remove in the Control Panel only to be told that some unnamed component was missing and the package can't be removed. So I tried reinstalling via the installation package thinking I'd get a clean installation that I could remove and subsequently reinstall from scratch. The install gets to 71% and stops, never progressing after that. So I tried removing through the installation package and it gets to 35% trying to remove "libeay32.dll" and never progresses.

I'm now running on a cloned harddrive taken about 30 days ago, my current clone backup is two days old and has the same problems as the active drive.

I'm frustrated beyond belief.

#12 Post by **GomJabbar** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 8:23 am

Check out this post by antera309. I believe it will help solve your problem. It's also possible you will need to reset the Winsock as posted by kano in the following post on the same thread.

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 458#215458

#13 Post by **Kyocera** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 9:44 am

I'd try running system file checker just for the heck of it, takes a few minutes but it may be able to repair some missing files.

jsteele · #14 Post by **jsteele** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 5:14 pm

Well, I am up and running again but I still have no idea what caused the problem. I ended up going back to a hard drive backup from mid-November. Fortunately, I had made no significant software changes since the backup. Because the original disk was not damaged I was able to put it in my second drive adapter and copy all of my other work to the replacement.

Still mystifying but I suspect some combination of updates and changes in late November.

#15 Post by **GomJabbar** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 5:59 pm

jsteele wrote:Well, I am up and running again but I still have no idea what caused the problem. I ended up going back to a hard drive backup from mid-November. Fortunately, I had made no significant software changes since the backup. Because the original disk was not damaged I was able to put it in my second drive adapter and copy all of my other work to the replacement.

Still mystifying but I suspect some combination of updates and changes in late November.

Hmmm. Kind of a shot in the dark here but the time frame falls in with the PC Doctor 5 update snafu. I was bitten by it and didn't realize I had a problem for nearly two weeks. FTR, I did not have the same symptoms as you. Really, to find out for sure if this was the case, you probably would have to put the problem image back on and check for missing/damaged entries in Windows Add or Remove Programs.

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=32675

Jedacite · #16 Post by **Jedacite** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 6:50 pm

jsteele wrote:Still mystifying but I suspect some combination of updates and changes in late November.

I know IE7 really mucked up my machine when Windows automatically pulled it down for me back in November. It totally messed up Windows and Access Connections most of all. If the connection wasn't available at bootup it would hang windows and you could forget about changing the profile.

Restoring to an earlier backup (and blacklisting the Ie7 update) seemed to work fine for me.

I'll probably retry IE7 in the future but I'll wait a while for everything to get smoothed out. I don't really use IE for anything other than windowsupdate.microsoft.com anyways.

jsteele · #17 Post by **jsteele** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 7:03 pm

jedacite

I too think that IE 7 may have been involved, the problem started right about the time it came out. I had been trying the release candidate and upgraded to the final when it came out and that's about when I started having problems. The backup I went to had IE 7 on it but I allowed the IE 7 update to download and install anyway and if it was involved it seems to be OK this time.

Unfortunately I haven't much choice but to use IE 7; we develop customer web based systems for corporate clients and they are pretty much wedded to IE.

So, for now it seems to be working (and I have a fresh backup at this stage along with several checkpoints

Purcy · #18 Post by **Purcy** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 7:04 pm

May I ask how you blacklisted the IE7 update? I have my system set for automatic updates and just went onto the windows update site and see that the IE7 update is the only update waiting for me to take. I don't know why my automatic update program did not bring it down but I am glad it didn't. I could not find a place to deny a certain update from downloading.

#19 Post by **GomJabbar** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 8:06 pm

Purcy wrote:May I ask how you blacklisted the IE7 update?

I haven't used it, but here it is: Toolkit to Disable Automatic Delivery of Internet Explorer 7

Jedacite · #20 Post by **Jedacite** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 10:03 pm

Purcy wrote:May I ask how you blacklisted the IE7 update? I have my system set for automatic updates and just went onto the windows update site and see that the IE7 update is the only update waiting for me to take. I don't know why my automatic update program did not bring it down but I am glad it didn't. I could not find a place to deny a certain update from downloading.

I have my automatic updates set to download automatically but let me choose when to install it.

When it says that you have updates waiting to install I always go custom cause it lets you choose.

I deslected IE7, and hit close. It asked me whether I wanted to keep it from automatically installing IE7 in the future and I said yes.

Although, GomJabbar's method is probably much easier as mine requires you not to use full-automatic updates and to not use express update.

That said, my laptop did not download it automatically once it was available. For whatever reason, after the restore (pre IE7) it didn't try to install IE7 until about a week ago. Weird, but fine by me.

#21 Post by **GomJabbar** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 10:22 pm

Actually, personally I have Automatic Updates turned off. I know that Microsoft comes out with their updates on the second Tuesday of every month. I always go to Microsoft Update from the Start Menu and choose the Custom rather than the Express button. For those few times when Microsoft has an out-of-cycle security update, I always read about it in the news, so I don't worry about missing it.

jsteele · #22 Post by **jsteele** » Sat Dec 16, 2006 12:21 am

Last week I thought I had solved the problem of the wireless just going away. The wireless rean fine all week. Today after a bout of repairing things with a corrupted outlook.pst file the system seemed to be in good shape and at 11:30 this morning I took a manual checkpoint.

As noted earlier, I use Access Connections 4.12 to manage the wireless. I used the system on and off all day including several hibernations. After each one the wireless recovered fine --- except the last one. For some reason known only to the gods of computing, when the system recovered from hibernation the wireless did not recover normally. The AC showed no signal, the wireless did not acquire the access point --- at least it didn't do so through AC.

It did actually acquire the access point using the Windows Wireless managment despite the fact that the network config was set to NOT use Windows management. In fact, the last time I checked the Windows wireless option tab was not even available in the connection profile.

I realized what was going on after I manually coaxed AC into connecting and the wireless kept going up and down --- because BOTH AC and Windows were controlling the connection, again despite the Windows management setting being off.

I straightened that out and now AC would not make the connection at all. The only way I could get it to connect properly was to use the 11:30 AM Restore Point! But there were no changes to the system between 11:30AM when the Restore Point was taken and 11:30 PM when the system was restored to that Restore Point.

jsteele · #23 Post by **jsteele** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 3:01 pm

A month later and I am still having the Generic Host Proces error. I must have reinstalled the Microsoft Hotfix a hundred times by now and it clears things up for a few days and then the next thing I know the problem is back.

I have been fighting this for several hours this morning and this time reinstalling the hotfix does not appear to have accomplished anything. I've ended up restoring to a checkpoint taken a week ago and things are back up now but I'm sure this will be back. I've used the sedn to microsoft option in th edialog each time this has happened but I'm confident nothing will result.

The information from the error message shows:
App Name:svchost.exe AppVer: 5.1.2600.2180 ModName: ntdll.dll
Modver: 5.1.2600.2180 offset: 0000ee05

I've run my virus scans, SpyBot and anything else I can think of. I've searched for the locations of svchost.exe and ntdll.dll in case there were bogus versions on the system but the search does not find anything other than the current version in the correct locations.

This is making me crazy.

Wireless and Generic Host Service failure making me crazy,

Wireless and Generic Host Service failure making me crazy,

Re: Wireless and Generic Host Service failure making me craz

Generic Host Process failure

Wireless Failure

The Continuing Saga Of Wireless Wierdness

I can't believe this is still going on

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