Networking problems with new batch of Optiplex 740s

Logichoops,

 

We already had those settings in our bios and are having the same problem.  We also went item by item and compared the bios settings to our older 740 and they were the same.  But the older machine had no problems and the newer one did.

 

B

Has anyone found a solution to this yet? 

 

We have been having the same problems.  We put the hard drive from a 740n "enhanced" into one of our old machines (an original optiplex 740).  The old machine worked fine with the "enhanced" image.  The only thing that came up was that the "enhanced" image asked for a MS UAA Driver (MS High Definition Audio) when put into the older machine.  We then installed this driver on an "enhanced" 740 and seemed to get results, but when our users tested it, it crashed again.  We have been able to create a crash using two different Access 2000 based network applications.

 

Right now we have a call into Gold Tech support and they are looking into it.

 

B

 

 

Sorry, I haven't been able to get at the system that had the motherboard changed until today. The revision number on the board is A00. From some posts to this thread it sounded like Dell might have a possible solution. Has any one heard the exact problem that may be occuring? Can Dell explain what might be happening?

logichoops,

 

The setting you mentioned are already set in a system I took out of the box and I used the preinstalled XP.

This system also lost it's network connection. 

 

Dell support has now tranferred "my" problem to technicians in Ireland.

Hello

 

I know Dell Work on a new bios version for this problem.

I don't know when this version are public, but the work arround are adding a other nic card.

 

The Dell computer are less cost but in this case with additional nic card and the time for working on the solution, this computer are very expensive !!!!

 

 

 

Updated information since starting this thread.....

 

We continue to be plagued by network freezing on our systems.  About 20 of our initial purchase of 85 systems have manifested the problem in some way, although I fear more will as my 2nd system only showed the problem after several weeks - then froze several times a day.

 

I contacted our account rep about this problem, citing this thread, and asking the best way we could go about solving this problem without going through first tier support.  He said we had no choice but to work through first tier support before he could escalate - despite the quantity of systems impacted.

 

Yesterday, we did this, using a machine reimaged to the original Dell image.  The machine network connectivity froze as Office was being installed.  First tier support's response:  remove Office and see if it happens again.  Since the problem is sporadic and difficult to replicate on demand, this means it will be weeks before we can get anywhere.

 

I've purchased 3 Intel PCI NICs and after installing one in my current 740 enhanced and disabling the onboard NIC, I've had zero problems.

 

I've almost resolved to having to purchase 85 Intel NICs to provide my users with reliable computers @ $22/each, but would welcome an approach to work with Dell to resolve this issue without devoting weeks of time with first-tier support on a problem which seems clearly to be the result of a hardware flaw.  I asked our account rep whether he could determine whether the discussion of a BIOS to address that was in development, but he stated that looking into this was not part of Dell's "protocol" in a situation like this.

 

If I learn anything as this process plays out that might prove useful, I'll post a follow up.  A few thoughts:

 

- when the network freezes occur, neither Broadcom's diagnostic program not Windows event log show the cause of the problem

-  our current theory is that large volume network transfers will force the NIC to fail (as it did yesterday on my computer in the middle of the transfer of a 3.2GB file.  This would be consistent with the fact that not all new users of the new 740 enhanced systems experience the problem - many may simply be doing very light network activity.

 

*sigh* - one of the reason we have historically purchased the Optiplex line is to get a more "corporate-friendly" system from Dell.  I hate to leave Dell as an institutional customer after over a decade - if there's a line or service option at higher cost where we can get reliable systems without this support experience, I'd gladly pay the cost premium in lieu of the time this is costing our support group and users.

Hello,

 

A new Bios released 2.1.8.

This bios solved all my problem with de 740s Enhanced.

I can deploy my 740s without additional nic card.

 

 

Since this problem seems to be so intermittent, can anyone else confirm that this new BIOS version solves our crashing problems?

I second that.  We will install the bios update and report back.

 

We have been having this problem in XP with all of the new enhanced 740s that we've received.  I'd love to try the new BIOS update, but it appears that it is not actually available for download from Dell's site.  Whenever I try to download it I end up in an empty directory on the FTP server or the transfer never starts.

We've been doing testing all day across multiple machines.  No reports of problems yet.

 

On my machine, which had been exhibiting the problem, I moved from the Intel card I'd installed back to the onboard broadcom card around 8AM.  I've been streaming Internet audio through the Broadcom for 7 hours now without a freeze, so I'm cautiously optimistic.

 

Curious that the changelog for this BIOS says nothing about the NIC....

I can confirm that the BIOS upgrade has fixed the problems we were having not one crash last week using the new BIOS on multiple machines

Yeah, so far so good here as well.  I would guess that the fix for the network problem comes under the "chipset" fix in the description.  Maybe it's not the built in NIC itself but something else on the mobo that is causing the NIC to drop?  Either way I'm waiting to see if we can go a week without problems then we can finally start rolling out these 740s.

I can verify its not fixed.  We have 10 740E with A00 boards that havent worked in a month.  Support gave us a list of things to do to troubleshoot but didnt know about the issue.  We have updated bios, video, network. and made a ghost image.  cant get them to fail in house, but they get out onsite and they freeze instantly.  Dell is sending us new mobos.  hope they work.