WinXP SP3 PCMCIA unPlug n Prey problem

[LandyRover]

Hi All..

Windows XP, SP3 and all updates etc (April 2011)

Old (early) style PCMCIA-GPIB card (Wide non latched cable connector) card.

Up till recently, all was well, shove the card in the slot, bong bing!  Found new hardware, find drivers, create restore point, hey presto, all working.

Do stuff...

Finish doing stuff etc.  Shut applicaiton down, unplug card a while later..

Bing Bong,  Winders carries on all is stable and nice....

Since an enforced and unintended NI driver suite update, to NI-488.2 V2.73  As a result of updating one of our principles software suites, they shoved out this later set of NI drivers.

It all took some 2 hours to complete the "update", and all *Appeared* well..

Card in slot, Bong Bing,  NO message about new hardware, but everything works....

Finish doing stuff, shutdown applicaiton, and a while later remove card...    silence   NO unplug card notification.    Then, a random time later, the PC as a whole locks solid.   No rat cursor movement, no kbd lock light activity (no matter how many times I hit the shift lock etc) and somtimes the CPU cooler doing a good paint-stripper impression.   LOTS of hot air etc..

This needs a forced shutdown (press and hold the power button, thogh sometimes battery out, and power off at wall.)

No damaged data files on reboot, and the machine is stable again, untill the next time *After* I use the PCMCIA-GPIB card.

This has only started happening, after the enforced update to V2.73 NI-488.2 drivers.  AFICT, our supplier used the appriopriate pre packaged NI driver installer.

All the NI background services are enabled and running, windows does not see any problem with the card when installed, and as earlier, all the app's that use it work just fine.

Whatever the problem is, it's caused by, or causing the removal of the card not to be recognised by the system, with inevitable catastrophic results.

Removing the cable instead of the card?  Sadly the cable is now (has been for a long time) permanently attached, to prevent damage and demise of the remaining cable ground contact!   Result, laptop with an 8' long dongle!   Or the PC often locks at the most inconveniant time posible.

Anyone got any ideas, diags or tests to try to identify and fix this?

Happy Easter, don't eat too much chocolate!

Dave

[MikeParkin]

Hi Dave,

Thanks for posting on the NI forums and for providing so much detail in your post.

It sounds like you are experiencing a very odd issue. The fact that the problem has only occured since you upgraded to NI-488.2 V2.73 would suggest this driver has upset part of your system. Do you remember what version you had before the upgrade?

Can I also ask what version of DAQmx you have installed?

[LandyRover]

Hi..

Thanks for the reply.

DAQmx V9.2.3 according to NiMax.   (Not used AFIK)

I can't exactly remember the exact version prior to the last forced update, but originaly it was on the CD that came with the PCMCIA card (all that time ago)

The system is *Much* more stable, if I disable either W32Time, or NI's time sync' component (start run "services.msc" and all that.   There is *A Lot* of NI stuff loaded and running, that is just not used or needed I think.)

I've also done a good swamp out of the registry (general settings etc) that too has made things much better behaved.  But I still get unexplained lockups about 30% of the time after using any NI tools with either PCMCIA or USB GPIB adapters.

Regards.

Dave.

[MikeParkin]

Hi Dave,

Its good to hear you have got the system running a little smoother.

So I can work out exactly what is causing the lockups would it be possible for you to send me and event log for the period that it occurs? This link here shows how to do it.

Once I have seen this the next step is likely to be an upgrade to NI 488.2 2.8.1 to see if this resolves the problem but I think we should hold back until we see what the event log shows.