Crashing Progress
In my previous post about my laptop I had described some stability problems. I was finally able to figure out what was causing it. I found eventually that it is most likely the Netgear WG111v2 wireless USB network adapter. It all started when the computer crashed occasionally. Originally I thought it was the new memory that I installed. I ruled that out after I installed some different memory. The strange thing was that the blue screen was sometimes not showing any driver and sometimes showing synTP.sys (touchpad), wg111v2.sys (wireless usb), and a couple others. I detail below my process for figuring this out.
One of the first things I did when I got the machine was to install RealVNC so I could get to some of the other computers. After about the fourth or fifth crash I noticed that it was always crashing while I was using VNC. Eventually I realized that I could make it crash within a minute or so if I opened VNC and moved the mouse around really fast. My next test was to run the machine for awhile without a network connection, which it handled just fine.
I downloaded and installed Azureus to test running a lot of data through the USB adapter. Again the computer crashed within a few minutes of starting some torrent downloads. To remove the next variable I connected the laptop to the router with a cable and ran Azureus again. This time it ran well for hours. I also tried the Linksys WGA11B wireless bridge again with nothing but success.
I did a few Google searches to find out if anyone else had these kinds of problems. I did find a few people that mentioned crashes while using P2P applications. There were also some Amazon customer reviews that were talking about some problems. I did check there before I bought it but there was a pretty good mix of good and bad. The reviews talked about the adapter overheating and losing connection all the time. One guy even said that he couldn’t maintain a connection unless there was a fan running pointing at it all the time! They were all complaining about losing connections, but nothing about crashing. I almost wonder if I should post a review.
I haven’t finished with this yet. Next up is to check if I have the most recent driver and firmware for the adapter. If it still fails though, I may undertake the project to install the internal wireless antenna and Mini-PCI card. That still looks like it may be a fun time.
I hope that this will help someone else and would love to hear if it does.
March 8th, 2006 at 6:45 pm
Heyi have exactly the same problem!!!! would appreciate it if you followed up if you managed to find a solution? same netgear adapter and same crashes at high speed downloads
Cheers
March 9th, 2006 at 8:03 am
I too have the same problem with this Wireless adaptor. In my case it crashes with the mouse cursor not responding at all and you have to use the restart button all the time. This happens in high speed downloads, iTunes whenever I’m downloading and even randomly browsing the internet!
Really annoying. Would be grateful if anybody had the answers. Have the new drivers and everything.
March 9th, 2006 at 8:37 am
Simon & James,
Thanks leaving messages. I haven’t been able to figure anything out further on this issue. Since I’ve been using the wireless bridge there hasn’t been much of an impetus for me to keep working on it.
I tried updating to all the most recent drivers to no avail. I also chose a bunch of other driver versions that I found and nothing stopped it. The one thing that I noticed the most about the device is that it can get quite hot to the touch. I saw some comments on Amazon.com reviews of people who kept losing connection when the adapter got so hot. One guy in Australia even said that it wouldn’t hold a connection at all unless he had a fan blowing directly on it.
If the problem is indeed related to how hot the device can get, there probably isn’t much that a driver can fix. It may be that we all bought from a defective batch or the more likely scenario is that they’re just a poor design.
James, if yours crashes all the time that may be a little different. For mine, it would work just fine until I started something that was using lots of bandwith (torrents, VNC, etc). I could browse around normally. My situation would always bluescreen, with different actual error messages. I’m not saying they’re not related. You’ve already tried my only piece of advice (trying newest drivers).
One other thing that I tried was to update the firmware on my router. I also have a Netgear router and I read somewhere that there could be an incompatibility issue with it and the adapter. Perhaps that could help you, James.
Sorry guys, but I’ll post if I figure anything else out.
Thanks,
carl
March 9th, 2006 at 6:56 pm
ok no worries i guess maybe it shud go back to netgear! Ive tried all sorts aswell, reinstalling windows lots of differnt drivers and nothing works! Mine almost gets very hot but wether that causes the crashes i dont know? Wireless network cards are very cheap now anyway so i guess ill just have to pick up a new one. Thanks alot neway and let me know if you have any breakthroughs
March 17th, 2006 at 6:47 am
Heya, I am having the same problem using a p2p prog called Soulseek. The funny thing is the system does not crash when I am using other p2p programs (bitlord, xdcc on irc, emule) it is only Soulseek. I agree that it must be the adaptor itself or maybe the usb driver, but then again, I have no problems using other usb devices. Should i go back to a cable type network? I am starting to hate wirelessness :/
March 18th, 2006 at 10:16 am
The problem is specific to the adapter and its only 15quid for a new wireless adapter so i wouldnt go for a wired network. My father runs a differnt netgear adapter and has no problems so i guess where just unlucky, thats odd tho mine crashes on bitlord and not limewire. It also crashed when streaming video aswell.
March 20th, 2006 at 8:41 am
Mine has just crashed on bitlord. The download speed was about 50kB/s and it showed ‘driver not less or equal blah blah blah’ tcpip.sys. I hope the problem goes away when I connect a cable to the ethernet card. I keep asking myself why isn’t there a netgear patch for this fault, I mean, they sure DO know about this, and yet we as users get no response from the manufacturer. This is how you lose customers. I have tried a different adapter (forgot the make) and it couldn’t ‘catch’ the signal from the netgear router, so I passed on trying anyting else. Time for me to go on ebay and buy a mile of jr45
March 24th, 2006 at 6:04 pm
i have a WG111v2 and it makes the system freeze and the conection cuts for like 10 seconds then it comes back. I recommend not to buy, buy another one instead just for a few $ more like a linksys wireless USB. I´m using a NEXXT wireless PCI and it works fine and it´s cheaper. I like more the USB adapter but it suks then I should use the cheap but secure NEXXT wireless PCI.
April 12th, 2006 at 12:30 pm
I had one of these things and it kept crashing my laptop. My father has just bought one and his is making his machine crash too. It gets real hot too.
May 17th, 2006 at 11:26 am
I have a wg111v2 from netgear with the same highspeed crashing problem. It will run anywhere between 10 minutes and 2 hours before completely freezing the system. ONE HINT: its not heat that’s killing this usb adaptor. This thing sucks a MAXiMUM of 2.5 watts, and after opening it up and attaching a generous heatsink, I’ve found no real difference in crash times. The driver is a real piece of crap BUT I’ve FOUND THAT DIFFERENT SYSTEMS HAVE DIFFERENT STABILITY LEVELS, and RAM MIGHT HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH IT. MY Desktop has one gig of pc400 DDR (irrelevant) and crashes quickly, but my laptop has 2 gigs of ram and rarely ever crashes with it. Netgear says something about service pack 2 systems filling up ram and crashing the system with this adaptor under torrenting conditions, but their driver fixes don’t work. Try a memory manager program (I know I will) to monitor what the heck the little bastard’s doing.
May 17th, 2006 at 1:40 pm
FIX:
Yep, looks like it was a memory problem after all. I used a free mem freeing program (Bysoft FreeRAM) to automatically check every half-second to see if memory needed to be freed up (make the settings strict). It registered frequent spikes that it would quickly allieviate and just sometimes RAM usage would plunge to 100% for a moment. Not impressed, I ran O&O defrag simultaneously with uTorrent and Hamachi (for an instant Netgear heartattack) and Windows still managed to stay alive. I’m going to keep an eye on that blinking blue light to see if it keeps up. Don’t buy Netgear CRAP!
July 24th, 2006 at 1:17 pm
Hey, I’ve got this thing working with XP SP2. Uninstall the NetGear Drivers and then connect the USB Adapter. Now windows will automatically install its own drivers which pretty much work… at least the computer doesn’t crash with the blue screen.
November 7th, 2006 at 4:11 pm
Guys, this is a problem with the Netgear WG111v2 driver. If you look at the Performance tab under the Windows Task Manager, you will see that the the total number of handles increase forever. This can get up to an rediculous total over time. This finally causes the system to crash or hang. The non-version 2 device and its associated driver works fine. I am currently trying to resolve this with Netgear, but as to date (2 months later) they staill havent replied to me. will keep you informed !!!
December 20th, 2006 at 10:36 pm
TRIED TO SWITCH BITLORD FROM MY DELL LATTITUDE D610 C:/PROGRAM FILES/BITLORD TO MY EXTERNAL LACIE 160 GIG VIA FIREWIRE PC CARD AND CONTINUE DOWNLOADING BUT PERCENTAGE COLUMN OF EXISTING DOWNLOADS TURNED TO 0. I KEPT ALL THE INCOMPLETE FILES ON BOTH DRIVES. EVEN MOVED THE C DRIVE BITLORD TO ANOTHER FILE TEMPORARILY , THAT DIDN’T HELP. IT WAS WHEN I SWITCHED THE SAVE PATH TO MY LACIE, THAT THE CURRENT PERCENTAGE DOWNLOADED WENT TO 0 THEN , EVEN WHEN I SWITCHED THE SAVE PATH BACK TO MY C DRIVE , IT STILL SAID 0 PERCENT. ANYWAY SOME FILES SHOW THE FULL PERCENT NOW AND SOME DON’T. DOES ANYONE KNOW WHAT THE PROCEDURE IS FOR WHAT I’M TRYING TO ACCOMPLISH HERE WITH BITLORD??? RAN OUTTA SPACE SO I JUST WANTED TO SWITCH THE DRIVE THAT BITLORD RAN FROM AND STORED TO.
December 26th, 2006 at 11:21 am
I experienced the same issue. I tried with latest set of drivers from Netgear but the problem persists. After 3-4 restarts, system keeps working for hours….
Can anyone help.
thanks,
Puneet.
February 23rd, 2007 at 1:20 am
I have same problem
first 2 months its work good
but now it always lost connection without anything notice
if i use bitcomet it takes 30 mins - 1 hour for hang and adaptor very hot
sometime i think i can cook by put it in chicken mouth, (maybe netgear company design for that)
Next lot they should labeled it with qoute “NOT FOR BITTORENT”
March 2nd, 2007 at 12:28 pm
This whole biz of the adapter heating up, azureus bringing on the BSOD is exactly whats been happening to me, only bought it two days ago, think its back to the shop, Any reccommendations?
March 11th, 2007 at 7:32 pm
i have perhaps the same problems:
during navigation also without P2P or playing in internet, the pc sometimes freeze, with no blue screen, but i need reset PC.
The LAN is OK, memtest ok, the problem is only with WG111T v1.3.
I’m not able
to write to forum netgear (fail login), and i arrive here because 1 post (only one) in that forum link here.
Curiosity, on my old PC with usb1.1, it’s all OK!!!!
March 14th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
I’m so glad I found this link as I’m having the exact same problem. I was worried it was my new PC but after some thinking I realised it had to be something to do with the adaptor, as I got the same BSOD’s on my old PC…Another guy above said don’t install the Netgear drivers and use the SP2 ones? Anyone tried this with success? I’m finding that I only get the BSOD’s with P2P applications, at random intervals. Very strange but apart from that, it’s relatively stable for me.
April 27th, 2007 at 10:18 am
I have a netgear WG111v2 with windows XP, and it was routinely freezing up, but not BSOD.
The latest drivers from netgear did not help.
Dont know how but I think I fixed it with the Bysoft freeram program on default settings.
This doesnt happen on my other machine so I will mention the motherboard is an Aopen MK77M-8XN.
May 18th, 2007 at 3:33 am
Hello all, After months and months of problems (certainly *not* issues!) with a WG111v2 a post on this blog has apparently provided a solution for XP Home SP2.
Once you have installed the manufacturer supplied drivers go to:
control panel > system > hardware tab > device manager > network adapters
Find your adapter, right click and ‘update drivers’. Click for ‘Yes, this time only’, click ‘next’, make sure ‘automatically’ is selected and click ‘next’ again.
After a wait new drivers supplied by M$ are installed and the adapter appears to work correctly.
I have tested this for maybe 15 minutes using Soulseek and no crash or freeze so far.
However, my uncertainty with the device and with the Netgear company would recommend any potential buyers to stay well clear of them. I shall be buying a new non-Netgear wireless adapter as soon as possible.
Good luck!
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:21 am
No, the Bysoft program did not fix it. Perhaps it just made it crash less. I have now bought a non-NETGEAR wireless stick and it works fine now.
June 21st, 2007 at 12:23 am
I have the same problem on XP Pro SP2 with the latest drivers 5.1283.207.2007 installed by M$ through automatic updates and it still freezes like clockwork. However Netgear claims that it is because I’m not using a Pentium class PC. See extract from support.
…
Based on the information that you have given, you are using an Athlon Processor. I reviewed the specification of the WG111v2 and as I verified, its requirement stated that it should be installed on a Pentium Class PC. Usually, if the device is compatible with other Class of PC, it will placed in there as part of reuirement like this device is also compatible with equivalent Class of PC such as AMD (Athlon).
…
Is there anyone that has this problem that is running a Pentium processor?
June 25th, 2007 at 11:27 pm
try using the usb ports closer to ur fan this worked for me
July 12th, 2007 at 4:47 pm
my drivers work fine
it overheats like a bitch though
i seriously touched it and i thought my hand was burnt
all from a usb adapter? come on
i have other ones on my other boxes that don’t heat up like this one..
only thing is the wg111v2 is one of the few value (cheap) adapters that will run on windows vista…
i have had it for about a week now, i found this page by searching for people who have heat problems with is…
any suggestions besides running a fan on it or w/e…??
November 17th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Switch off Wireless zero config as this hooks onto other APs causing wireless lag. Try pinging on 192.168.0.1 for about 3 mins ( use the -t option - PING -t 192.168.0.1). After ctrl C to stop PING if MAX >400ms you’ve got problems.
First open up task manager (ctrl-alt-del) and end RTWLAN & RTLWAKE
THEN -
How to switch off WZC:
START
control panel
admin tools
services
look for Wieless Zero Config
Right click on WZC, select ‘STOP’
Right click on WZC, select ‘PROPERTIES’
in STARTUP drop down menu select ‘DISABLED’
Reboot PC
Job done!
December 9th, 2007 at 8:21 am
There’s a newer driver which seems to fix a memory problem:
WG111 and WG111v2 Software Version 2.1
[…]
3. Fixed the utility handle increase that cause the memory add up and freeze the system.
[…]
http://kbserver.netgear.com/release_notes/D102534.asp
January 10th, 2008 at 12:33 am
have yous got service pack 2 installed? if u dont it makes your PC crash using broadband