Strange problem after power outage

[Cryofax]

So I've got an HTPC running Windows Media Center on Windows 7, and an Xbox 360 extender. The 360 runs into an 8-port switch that runs to my SBG6580 Gateway (Router/Modem). The HTPC runs directly into the Gateway. The gateway goes to comcast via coaxial cable.

Everything was working fine until we had a blackout. Lasted under a minute. Everything seemed fine afterward but now I have this odd issue where the XBox 360 won't find the HTPC media center after the HTPC goes to sleep and wakes back up. Resetting the HTPC fixes it. The HTPC seems to work fine in every way after waking up. Internet is fine, I can watch HBOGo, Netflix etc or even watch TV locally on the HTPC. I can ping the HTPC. But the 360 won't see it until an HTPC reset. The Xbox also seems to be fine otherwise during this time.

The gateway and switch have been reset, all settings are correct. Even moved network cables to new plugs on the gateway/switch. Any ideas?

[adam1991]

Something in your network is going to sleep.

[Mpgrimm2]

This may not help but I had a similar problem that turned out to be my router kept rebooting itself randomly (plus power outages). I don't recall who mentioned it, but move the htpc, network tuners and any extenders to the same switch and less important/critical items over to the router/gateway. During a glitch, the switch is apparently better able to keep things working as before. This is how I finally discovered the router problem.

I detailed this in one off my posts if you want to search for it.
Here..
http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... 881#p79881

im not too familiar with how switches work.. does having the ETH on a switch give it its own set of IP addresses, or will it just take the same set of ip addresses from the router

Me neither, but from what I have been able to piece together.... The switch doesn't need to know what the IP address is (Layer 3) because, it >>>forwards>>> based upon the MAC address (Layer 2).

https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Ak ... t-418&fp=1

[Cryofax]

Thanks for the replies.

So I've definitely tied it to the HTPC going to sleep. If I turn off the Xbox 360, in device settings a trouble exclamation points appears next to the Extender icon (as it should, since it's off). As soon as I turn the Xbox 360 back on the trouble exclamation point disappears and it works fine. BUT, if the HTPC goes to sleep, then the Xbox 360 is turned on it doesn't resolve the problem and won't work. Even though the 360 will cause the HTPC to come out of sleep mode the exclamation point remains by the extender icon in device settings and the 360 can't find WMC.

However I CAN fix the problem by disabling and re-enabling the adaptor in network settings. So somehow sleep mode is borking some setting in the adaptor. But everything else on the HTPC network related (Netflix, internet, filesharing) still works. Bizarre.

[glugglug]

I think the WMC PC has to announce that it is listening for multicast so that the extenders can find it when they announce they want to connect. Most cheap switches would probably just send the multicast to everybody but I guess yours doesn't?

When the PC goes to sleep, if it sleeps the network adapter, the router probably takes it out of the list of multicast listeners. I think there is a setting in the network adapter properties to not put the NIC to sleep, which should keep the router from doing that. (but maybe it will break wake on LAN?)

[Crash2009]

What a coincidence. Had a power failure during the storm last night. Started the HTPC back up, BIOS asked if I wanted the defaults, yeah OK. Fires up nothing works. Hmmm....Date is 2080, back to BIOS to fix the date. Only half working.....Back to BIOS, its been 3 years, I forget how I tweaked it. Flip this, unflip that, blah, blah, blah. Got it working. Video looks like crap, extenders looks great. Only 4 choices IGFX-GFXO-GPP-PCI. 4 more reboots. BINGO.

Looks like I need a new MB battery.

The point is..... The Strange Problem you have "might be" related to your BIOS.

[Scallica]

Every HTPC should be plugged into a UPS. I use this one:

http://www.amazon.com/APC-BR700G-Back-U ... =apc+br700

[DavidinCT]

Every HTPC should be plugged into a UPS. I use this one:

http://www.amazon.com/APC-BR700G-Back-U ... =apc+br700

Or at least weekly backups that run (more if you do cablecard protected recordings). I have acronis setup to do a backup every Saturday night to a networked machine (so the backup is not on the WMC machine).

it has saved me a few times...

[Cryofax]

I appreciate all the replies. The latest things I've done as time allowed:

Discovered disabling and re-enabling the HTPC internet adaptor in windows network settings fixes the problem (so no need for a full HTPC power cycle).
The switch is not the problem. I ran the XBox 360 directly to the router along with the HTPC and the problem persisted.
Made sure the router had UPnP and Multicast enabled (even disabled and re-enabled to be sure).

Next I'll give the bios settings a check. Like i said everything works fine except the extender AFTER the htpc goes to sleep. All other network functions work perfectly on both the htpc and xbox 360.

P.S. You're right about a UPS. Mine just died on me like a week before this happened and I hadn't gotten around to replacing it. Figures.

[Crash2009]

1- Have a look in the NIC Power Management area.
2- Check out your Sleep Settings in the Bios. S1, S2, etc.
3- Un-install any software that was included with your "old" UPS. (if applicable)
4- Look into a utility named "powercfg". The results might give you more clues. Open an elevated command prompt and run powercfg /energy. Then open energy-report.html

[Cryofax]

Thanks again for the replies. Bios settings were all fine (I resaved them anyway just in case). Energy report showed nothing unusual.

I did discover something odd though. It seems if I put the HTPC to sleep manually the Xbox 360 extender can wake it up and WMC works just fine. However if the HTPC puts ITSELF to sleep the Xbox will wake it up, but can't find WMC. So somehow manual sleep and my power profile sleep do something differently.

[Crash2009]

Energy report showed nothing unusual.

It seems if I put the HTPC to sleep manually the Xbox 360 extender can wake it up and WMC works just fine.

However if the HTPC puts ITSELF to sleep the Xbox will wake it up, but can't find WMC.

So somehow manual sleep and my power profile sleep do something differently.

All 3 of these events (with a description of the cause) should be listed when you run powercfg. Do you need help on how to run it, or view the energy report?

[Cryofax]

All 3 of these events (with a description of the cause) should be listed when you run powercfg. Do you need help on how to run it, or view the energy report?

Should I be starting the energy report 60 second scan and getting these errors to occur while it's scanning? I didn't realize it kept an event log all I saw after the fact was a run down of how I had my system configured for power savings/sleep and it was what I expected. I've used powercfg for tracking down sleep problems but never the energy report, so pardon my ignorance if it should have been run WHILE the errors were occuring.

[Crash2009]

I think I would run powercfg .......before, in-between, and after, the 2 events in the previous post.

[Cryofax]

UPDATE : So I got the problem to disappear when I changed my network cabling. I had the 360 Extender going into a WiFi Gb Router (being used as a WiFi/switch with routing off), then into the Cable Modem/Router Gateway. Meanwhile my HTPC went into an 8-port Gb switch then to the Cable Modem/Router Gateway. When I plugged the output from the wifi/switch directly into the 8-port switch the problem stopped.

So I guess somehow the Cable Mode/Router Gateway acting as intermediary wasn't passing correct data updates from the wifi router/switch (Xbox) to the 8-port gigabit switch (HTPC).

Any idea why this would be? This setup is fine but I hate not knowing what the cause was.