D Series Issue: End Program - Sample

Question

I have observed this behaviour on a couple of D series laptops with Intel 2100 Cards installed. When shutting down an End Porgram request appears naming the program "Sample" as not responding. There is a timer present at the end of which supposedly the program will be stopped. When the progress bar fills, however, there is the option to either ignore or end program. The laptop will not shut down unless you select End Now.

In attempting to trouble shoot the program I began running down the process list trying to find out what "Sample" could possibly be. If I stop Zero Config then the message does not appear on shutdown. With Zero Config running, however, the message will appear every time reguardless of the 2100 adapters state (eg Enabled, disabled, radio off/on, etc). I have been unable to replicate this error reliable on other laptops with 2100s. It seems to be an "If it's got it it's got it but if not you can't make it do it" sort of issue.

There are no newer versions of the 2100 drivers.
There are no windows updates available(except for the wireless security update but that just completely hoses the wireless card anyways).

Laptops known effected are 1 D800 running XP (obviously) and 1 D600 also running XP.

Any ideas?

JohnM025 · Answer

dracol1ch,

Try the following.

1. Go to START | RUN and type "msconfig" (without the quotes) in the "Open" box; click on "OK".

2. Click on the Startup tab and remove all checks EXCEPT for :

ScanRegistry,

TaskMonitor,

PCHealth,

SystemTray,

LoadPowerProfile,

SynTPLpr,

SynTPEnh,

LoadPowerProfile.

Don't worry if all are not present.

3. Click on "OK". You will be prompted to REBOOT. Allow your system to reboot.

4. After the system has restarted, see if the problem still occurs.

If the problem still occurs, then you can put all the checks back in MSCONFIG, because your startup is not the problem.

If the problem no longer occurs, go back into msconfig, and recheck the items in startup one at a time.

You will need to click OK and REBOOT after each item is checked to test if that item is the cause of the problem.

Thank you for choosing Dell.

dracol1ch · Answer

Done. No effect. With all startup items disabled the end program dialoge still comes up.

dracol1ch · Answer

Bump! Anybody at all seen this? C'mon. I personally have seen it on 3 laptops with the Intel Wireless cards. Am I the only person that bought them?

berlingoff · Answer

We bought 4 D800's with the 2100 cards and non of them have this problem.   What software have you installed, or are these completely stock machines?

jaysun5 · Answer

I have seen this message on three Latitude D600s we recently purchased. The message, however, didn't appear until I disabled the Spectrum24 Event Monitor service. I disabled that in order to troubleshoot why the machines were taking 2 minutes between showing the desktop background with the mouse cursor and the prompt to log in. Disabling that service fixed the problem, but then I ended up with the 'Sample' program problem!! Did you ever figure this out?

dracol1ch · Answer

Yes I did. My issue had to do with the Intel 2100 drivers. Apparently Dell is shipping some of the D series laptops with older version of the Intel wireless drivers. These drivers have the 'Adaptive Network Adapter Switching' (or some such) enabled. I had to disable this in order to make my VPN software work but unfortunately that caused my 'End Program - Sample' message. The solution was to uninstall all intel wireless drivers compeletly and then reinstall the latest ones from Dell's web page. I hope this helps.

SirOssis · Answer

I had this problem on a Dell D800.

The Intel PRO set had been put on this system by mistake, and I was getting Not Responding errors from the phantom sample" program at shutdown (it was actually happening twice at shutdown).

I traced it back to ZCfgSvc.exe which is part of the PRO set from Intel.

Uninstalling got rid of the first phantom "sample". I will update when I figure out the second one.

RickRoyston · Answer

Many thanks to SirOssis for solving 50% of a problem I have had for six months. And it looks as if I'm not the only one.

Q. How did you manage to pin down ZCfgSvc.exe as the culprit?

Q. Any suggestions for getting rid of the second phantom "sample"?

Thanks again.

Brett1968 · Answer

I purchased a Dell D800 late last year and have been having the same problems with the "Sample" program not allowing the machine to shutdown (at least without pressing the end process button).

I have followed this discussion thread and downloaded the latest driver files for the 2100 card and followed the instructions that came with it to no avail. As far as I can tell it failed to install the newer driver files as the version number displayed is still the older one, namely 4.0.24.0, as opposed to 4.1 as on the Dell web site.

Any ideas on how to 'force-feed' the machine the newer version of these drivers would be appreciated.

In speaking with a Dell Customer Support person this morning (40mins on hold) I was advised that I had the nimda virus on my machine. One hour later after running a removal tool I was advised (by the software) that the virus was not present on my machine.

I then found this discussion thread and breathed a sigh of relief that I wasn't the only one experiencing this issue.

Any help appreciated.

Brett

dracol1ch · Answer

I actually had to remove the old drivers first. It's been a bit since I did it so I'm not 100% sure exactly what steps I took but if you can't see the intel drivers in Add/Remove programs try using the 'Uninstall' button on the devices property panel in Device Manager. Then install the latest driver package.

Brett1968 · Answer

Thanks for that information.

I did what you said and it works fine. For anyone that is interested, firstly remove the Intel ProSet software, then uninstall the drivers for the 2100, then install the new software/drivers (file R64838.exe).

Just installling the software as directed on the Dell web site will NOT work.

Thanks for your help dracol.

Brett

the_jackel · Answer

hollo, i have the same problem with my D500 notebook i have the last recommondation will help me thanx...

PSMINN · Answer

I also have the same problem with my I8600. Now, if this fixes my problem with activesync not installing I will be Oh so happy! Pam

PSMINN · Answer

Unbelievable! I can now install activesync. That was a totally unexpected surprise! Pam

Danerss · Answer

I was also seeing the same End Program - Sample message on my D600s, even the Drivers included in the Resource CD are not of use and only the latest drivers from Dell seem to address this problem, Thanks for the Info!

Updating Drivers on every D600. Just what I need, one more collosal waste of time.

Locked Topics – Laptops General

D Series Issue: End Program - Sample

Was this post helpful?