SERVICES.EXE Fails With Access Violation and Returns RPC Busy...

The information in this article applies to:

• Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 3.5
• Microsoft Windows NT Server version 3.5

SYMPTOMS

The "RPC Server is too busy..." message indicates that SERVICES.EXE or one of its threads may have hung. A thread may remain in a blocking state and appear to be hung if a resource is not available.

SERVICES.EXE is a process which functions as the service control manager. It also runs a variety of Windows NT user mode functions as threads including server, browsing, event log, and RPC services. The symptoms are typically returned by workstations performing commands including net view, event log, and other related RPC requests. Client RPC requests to the pipe \SRVSVC, will result in Server Message Block (SMB) errors returned with STATUS_PIPE_NOT_AVAILABLE by the server. If the failure involves a SERVICES.EXE access violation, a DRWTSN32.LOG will be present in the %SYSTEMROOT% directory. Often, NET USE sessions provided by the server remain active and new sessions can be established. The following messages may be returned to client requests involving the RPC services:

   Error 1723:  The RPC server is too busy to complete this operation.
   Error 1722:  The RPC server is unavailable.
   Error 1721:  Not enough resources are available to complete this
                operation.

CAUSE

One possible cause of these symptoms involves the use of a 15 character computername that is resolved through the Sockets interface to domain name service (DNS). A parsing error can occur resulting in intermittent heap corruption. If DNS resolution is configured through the Control Panel TCP/IP DNS dialogue box, the computername may be resolved in this manner. The results of the heap corruption are not predictable. However, an access violation in SERVICES.EXE may result if a critical data structure is damaged. Also, the server will only attempt to resolve the name in order to establish a session with the computer in question. These operations may not occur frequently. However, the computer browsing service, print services or messenger service may initiate requests for such operations.

RESOLUTION

To correct this problem, install the new LMHSVC.DLL file.

LMHSVC.DLL has been modified so that the computer name is correctly parsed.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Windows NT version 3.5. This problem was corrected in Windows NT version 3.51. of tagging ds:0023:0015fbf8=20