Quickbooks crashes with multiple users, other network problems, please help! : quickbooks, network

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03.09.2007 at 07:07AM PST, ID: 22439073

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Quickbooks crashes with multiple users, other network problems, please help!

Zones: Quickbooks Financial Software, Windows Networking, SBS Small Business Server

Tags: quickbooks, network

Here's the situation:

I was called in by a client because of computer problems. At first, it seems that it was a desktop problem that only a few users were having. I did some spyware checks and cleanup, and checked out some other things. While I was doing that, stuff started crashing around me. There are several Quickbooks users, and their software would all lock up and crash their computers. One or more times, everyone in the office would freeze up at the same time.

They are on a SBS2003 server running XP Pro with Active Directory. Here's the other factor: their server has had a lot of problems, some disk errors etc. and they had been advised to replace it or allow me to do an overhaul on it with a temp replacement. Nothing new has shown up on the server that would indicate that the problem has worsened. (the server hosts the company's files, including Quickbooks)

There are also some other peer-to-peer type db aps that they run which also seem to be crashing and freezing up. Error messages usually say lost connection or check for disk problems on those. Quickbooks was occasionally doing a "you lost connection to your file" error.

The third factor is that they tell me they occassionally hear a steady alarm or beeping sound from time to time from some locations where there are UPSs (rather old) hooked up at workstations and in the server room. The switch is less than a year old, but the fans were blocked.

I have rebooted the server, I updated them to SP1, and checked on other things. They had been having problems with C: filling up, and their CALs would disappear, but we cleared off some space for them, and things were working sort of normally for a while.

While I understand there are lots of overall problems here (they ran to the store and bought me an appropriate temp machine to be a server for me to migrate to while we overhaul their current one with new hard drives, etc.), I just need to get them back up and running so I don't have to spend all night and all weekend running around like a retard trying to rebuild their whole network.

I'm considering trying a new switch just for fun. What other network problems can you guys think of that could crash all the computers at once, and crash connections to aps on the server? Any thoughts are appreciated.

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Question Stats

Zone: Software

Question Asked By: dempsedm

Solution Provided By: manicsquirrel

Participating Experts: 4

Solution Grade: B

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03.09.2007 at 07:25AM PST, ID: 18687770

ssnyds:

It sounds to me like they are having power spikes or the server is restarting itself the beeping noise hopefully is coming from the UPS and not the Server, check the event logs, also, is this SBS box the only server?

03.09.2007 at 07:37AM PST, ID: 18687883

Rank: Sage

RobWill:

Some databases do not like dropped connections, so that can cause all sorts of problems. The beeps are as you said likely the UPS's. Are the batteries working properly ? If not you may have equipment temporarily shutting down, such as the switch which should be plugged into the UPS. I would test the UPS under a load for starters. Also where you are having disk errors, back up that data NOW!
QuickBooks has a data verification tool you should run, located under file on the menu bar. This will tell you if there the file is corrupt and adding to your problem. If it does report errors you can do a data rebuild, but do a back up of the data first. It should ask you to do so, but just in case...
One other thing, make sure power management is turned off on all network adapters under the network adapter's properties in device manager.

03.09.2007 at 08:08AM PST, ID: 18688144

Rank: Master

kadadi_v:

Yes RobWill is correct you have to reconfigure the total client office infrasture /ups/server and network problems.So bffore doing this take the imp data backup on external USB hard disk and then check the UPS is properly running and batterries are charging and giving the backup or any reseting problem to UPS after power management factor solved then automatically system / server restart and HDD error problems will be solved.

Then In network management check the router/ switches /Network cards /cat5 cbales problem using UTP tester and using network monitoring tools .If 10-20 pc's on the network then you can check the pc's congiguration one by one for antivirus scan and wiindows / antivrus / software updates .

And For Quickbooks application take the support from the vendors / enginners of QB application to take the backups/reinstalltion and restore of data.

Regards,

V.K.

03.09.2007 at 09:06AM PST, ID: 18688706

dempsedm:

Ok, fyi- data is all backedup. Also, I'm getting Userenv 1091 event on the server: group policy client-side extension Security failed to log rsop data...etc.

would this be a cause for network problems?

We have a brand new UPS on the way. I'm just trying to figure out if this is a network hardware problem, or a server/AD problem. I have some switches I can stick in, but I want to make sure I'm barking up the right tree. I will look in to the other suggestions.

Also, I tried to verify QB data yesterday, and it would either freeze up, or make it partially, then stall. I may try to install QB on the server, or move the data files, verify them, then move them back.

03.09.2007 at 09:10AM PST, ID: 18688749

dempsedm:

Yes, SBS is the only server for this business.

03.09.2007 at 09:12AM PST, ID: 18688764

Rank: Master

kadadi_v:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/823608

Regards,

V.K.

03.09.2007 at 10:39AM PST, ID: 18689431

Rank: Sage

RobWill:

>""I may try to install QB on the server, or move the data files, verify them, then move them back.
"
Good idea. Could get corruption if you do data re-build over your network.

What version of QB ? year and release # ?
Not 2004/2005 R4 by any chance.

03.09.2007 at 10:40AM PST, ID: 18689440

dempsedm:

1091 and 1704 are the ones showing up, 1704 is info, not error: Security policy in the Group policy objects has been applied successfully.

Also, I was exploring file corruption as a cause. Here is a QB thread for people with some similar problems(error code 64 sometimes shows up): http://www.quickbooksgroups.com/webx/forums/install/Networking/405

I ruled out corruption, unless it happens instantly by copying a fresh sample business QB file over to the share. I could open the file from the 1st computer, then all subsequent connections failed and locked up QB. I'm now going to attempt to share the files from a workstation and see if the problem happens then. Right now, it appears that the rest of the network is functioning fairly normally aside from the QB problem. Once I have a workaround, I will focus my efforts on the server.

I'm going to do an in-line swap to a workstation as a temp server using sbsmigration.com, rebuild the server with new drives, and migrate it back online.

03.09.2007 at 11:43AM PST, ID: 18689871

dempsedm:

QB works if it is shared from a workstation. The rest of the network aps seem to be running somewhat normall now. I actually think that QB from the server was crashing the other Aps, if that is possible? Now I think with new UPS on the way, I think they are willing to let me overhaul the server situaton in one manner or another.

-dd

03.09.2007 at 02:21PM PST, ID: 18690981

Rank: Sage

RobWill:

I had asked earlier about QB version as I ran into a similar situation a little less than 2 years ago, at a client site. As soon as they upgraded from release 3 to 4 ( I believe 2004), if there was more than 1 user using QB, the application would hang, actually appear to freeze, and lock up the entire workstation. It would, after 1-3 minutes, return to normal. This happed numerous times per hour. It too was on SBS 2003. When I looked into it on the QB forum, a few others had the same issue. QB said there was no problem. Before it was resolved they swtched to 2006.

03.09.2007 at 03:16PM PST, ID: 18691283

dempsedm:

I think they are on 2005. They are switching to a different accounting system in a few months, so we probably don't need to upgrade...

03.10.2007 at 09:36PM PST, ID: 18696348

Rank: Master

manicsquirrel:

Just a note on QB 2006 and 2007. You have to have the DBManager for QB installed on the server - really nothing else installed. Additionally, and this is the important one, the QB installer creates a QBDBManagerUser17 (or something like that) as a user in AD.

You must make sure that user is assigned to whatever folder is housing the data files and has access permissions that propogate down to the child files and folders.

Accepted Solution

03.12.2007 at 08:25AM PDT, ID: 18702674

dempsedm:

Thanks for the info, it is possible that someone messed with user rights. Maybe that is what fixed it when I moved them to a different share with rights to "everyone". We didn't have QB installed on the server it was being shared off of, but we never had and it worked without incident. Does the new QB user that it creats use up one of our per user CALs?

03.12.2007 at 08:35AM PDT, ID: 18702794

Rank: Master

manicsquirrel:

I should think not. No more so than any of the other built-in accounts.

03.20.2007 at 06:19PM PDT, ID: 18761034

dempsedm:

I accepted Manic's suggestion as the answer, however I am not able to verify what was causing the problem. I have a new UPS to install, and I'm going to free up some time to rebuild their server. I'm leaning more towards something like what Manic suggested because once I moved off the share and onto a share on a workstation, the QB and network crashes stopped.

Thank you for all of your input, and I'll post back here if I find out anything else!

03.20.2007 at 06:29PM PDT, ID: 18761069

Rank: Sage

RobWill:

Not to question Manic's suggestion at all, but don't completely rule out other issues such as "server has had a lot of problems, some disk errors etc.", network wiring issues, or a bad server NIC, as all of these were eliminated by moving the data file to a workstation.
Good luck with it and let us know the ultimate resolution when confirmed. Always good to know.
Cheers !

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