Mavericks (10.9.1) repeatedly losing LAN
 

I run a Mac on a PC based LAN. Ever since upgrading to Mavericks, I've been losing the network on an hourly basis. The only way I can seem to reconnect is by logging out and on again. The IT Dept where I work will not support Macs, so I'm pretty much on my own solving this.

I know there's been a LOT of chatter online about Mavericks dropping networks, but surely not every hour??? I have tried all the work-arounds I can find online, but to no avail. You can probably tell that I'm no techie, but am forced to work this thing out myself.....

I have one Ethernet port connected to the LAN, the other one is connected to a RAID device. I'm hoping someone clever than I am can look at the attached screenshots and offer help.

It is costing me time and money, and any pointers or advice you have will be gratefully received.

OSX Mavericks 10.9.1
Model Name: Mac Pro
Model Identifier: MacPro5,1
Processor Name: Quad-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 3.2 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 8 MB
Memory: 8 GB
Processor Interconnect Speed: 4.8 GT/s
Boot ROM Version: MP51.007F.B03

Not much input here, but every hour like clockwork? IE, at 09:20 the network dropped, then again at 10:20? Do both network interfaces lose connectivity simultaneously?

1. Check the Console for log messages that might be informative.

2. 169.254 IP addresses are usually self-assigned for devices that can't find a DHCP server, and "not good" for networking. Is that the LAN or the RAID?

Certainly quite odd. I do lots of network hopping and use vlans without any issues with multiple DNS and DHCP servers on 1/2 interfaces at same time and have not come across many issues.

I am trying to work out what is going on with the small amount of info you provided.

By looks of things - Ethernet 2 should be Set as Primary interface as i presume this is the corporate LAN no doubt connecting you internet and access to file servers etc. ( System prefs > Network > Little Cog > Set Service order > put at top)

Ethernet 1 you say is connected to a RAID is it in fact a NAS/iSCSI/SAN type storage device ? -
The DNS server IP address range in DNS looks like an external network type. Please explain what the hardware is and how it is supposed to work. Yes it has been assigned a self signed IP which of course means no networking and router is blank so looks like no DHCP server. Can IT provide you with a manual (fixed) IP and all relevant information to setup manually instead of DHCP just for testing on Ethernet 1?

Another thing to try is taking IPV6 out of equation on Ethernet 1
sudo networksetup -setv6off "Ethernet 1"]

Really regardless of whether IT support your machine, Network people should be able to assist regardless of platform. It clearly is far from a normal flat basic network.

I BLOODY HATE SINGLE PLATFORM IT ENGINEERS !

Assuming that the RAID device is a NAS, why aren't you connecting it to your network instead of your other ethernet port? It's not that it is impossible to get it working in the way you are currently connected to it, but connecting it directly to your computer over ethernet involves solving some challenges that you won't have if it's connected to your network. To start with, it needs an IP address--right now it's not getting one so it is self-assigning itself the 169.254.x.x address.

Or if you don't want to connect it to your network because you need more speed from this RAID, does it offer any kind of non-network connection? USB or FireWire or eSATA or Thunderbolt or even SCSI?

Second.

Trevor

Thanks all for the replies. In no particular order:
1) The NAS isn't allowed on the IT-managed LAN, as it's all Mac work. No, I don't know why they're so paranoid! I think I can hook the NAS up to my Mac using SATA instead... Will investigate - and report back.

2) Don't know if this sheds any light, but the internet connection never fails. Even though the assorted PC servers do.

3) Looking at the console log is a good idea. If I knew what it was and where to find it! (I did mention I'm no techie!)

4) Most importantly, a big THANK YOU for bothering to help me. I'm back at home right now, but will add more tomorrow.

The Console.app is located in /Applications/Utilities/Console.app.

What brand and model NAS is it?

Oh! That's new information. Before you had said that the network fails, now you're saying the you lose connection to PC servers on the network, but maintain the network (you couldn't have an internet connection if your network actually wasn't working). That's a much more limited failure, so it is good news.

In that case, I would also be very interested in seeing what your logs said, timestamped at the point when connection to those PC servers failed.

As jsalmi says, launch your Console app, which is found in /Applications/Utilities. For starters, just set it to look at "All Messages". Notice that messages are (almost) all time and date stamped.

http://mac.elated.com/wp-content/uploads/console.png

Now, scroll back to the last time when you lost connection to the PC servers. What are the messages immediately before and at that time that you see in your logs?

Trevor

Ok your issues are due to you not IT as such. [sorry not being rude]
I absolutely agree you should not be allowed to just dump your NAS device on your work network. There are many reasons why !

So you should follow what I said firstly this is all nothing to troubleshoot IMHO it is configuration issue. Get your computer on company network working properly so you can get on file shares internet etc.

As far as your NAS you need to configure it correctly and then setup the networking on your Mac Pro and NAS so it works independantly of your work network. Of course other option if it supports it is to direct attach the NAS as a "hard disk"

Me again - sorry I didn't post yesterday, but the UK is having some pretty grim weather. Power was intermittent.

What part of the console logs do you need to see? There are Adobe threads, Quark threads - can't see anything about networking. I've attached the whole shebang, but there's LOADS to trawl through...

The NAS is a Buffalo TS-QVHL Terastation Pro Quad NAS. It only has USB ports (that I can't seem to get to work) and two ethernet ports.

Is there anything else that I can supply to help someone clever zero in on the problem?

Thanks
BD

It seems that I can't upload the damn log. Too big.
Can someone help me narrow the parameters down?

I tried connecting to one of the dead servers, then screencaptured the attached. Maybe this helps?

Launch your Console app, which is found in /Applications/Utilities. For starters, just set it to look at "All Messages". Notice that messages are (almost) all time and date stamped.

Now, scroll back to the last time when you lost connection to the PC servers. What are the messages immediately before and at that time that you see in your logs?

Trevor

It is likely this NAS is set to get an IP address by DHCP. As there is no DHCP server it is not getting an IP and as such is not configurable etc.

Now you could use the internet sharing feature on OS X to enable the OS X DHCP server on the correct interface. IT IS IMPERATIVE you do this correctly or you could effect your work network. Once you have turned this on you plug NAS in on Ethernet 1 your NAS should get an IP address and maybe even show in Finder sidebar. Then you can login, configure, file share etc.

Overall this is process.
Make sure you set Ethernet 2 as Primary interface (i.e. your work network) as i advised. You still have not said if you did this.
Then System Preferences > Sharing > Internet sharing > Tick on
Share connection from Ethernet 2 to Computers using Ethernet 1
Click Apply

The NAS will be isolated form your work network with only you being able to connect to it from your machine.
Your NAS should also have internet connectivity.

Thanks to you all.
I finally managed to screenshot the console at a time when the network dropped. Of course the trouble is that I don't know the servers have gone until I need to use em, so the console just fills with pages of arcane stuff. But hopefully the attachment may now shed some light on it.

agentx: I did try what you suggested, but it caused some weird issues. Internet access was blocked, as was server access. Really appreciate your help, btw. But I cancelled internet sharing so that I can get going again.

I don't know if this is relevant, but my connection with the networked office printers never fails - and they are on the same network as the servers. I just can't figure this out!

Setting Ethernet 2 as primary interface should not have done anything to your connection to work network.

I give up on NAS. You could buy a router to sort all your issues out without messing about.
It's possible that Internet sharing is broken in mavericks too. I don't use it anywhere.

Your problems with "disconnect" to server may not be related to networking IMHO it is Apple woeful SMBX implementation. We have not deployed Mavericks in business as there are so many issues connecting and using windows file shares.

Tbh I would try Ethernet 1 connecting with a new cable to work network and see how it goes. Maybe ask IT to do some diagnostics on the Ethernet port on switch.

You could try connecting to file shares using SMB 1 protocol
http://hints.macworld.com/article.ph...31122083837447

Also the we still have our fair share of issues on Macs in a windows environment in 10.8.5. In fact a ton of problems still with Mavericks server file shares in testing too. Once again it's not Apples finest hour as far their mantra of "it just works"

Some of blame is with MS office 2011 :-(

That's useful information (although in the future, it would be better for you to attach a text log rather than a graphic. We can't copy/paste text from an image, not to mention it uses a lot more storage space.)

Looking for that error message, here are a few useful links:

OS X Mavericks SMB2 Troubles? Here’s a Workaround

OS X 10.9 Mavericks Workaround for SMB

Macbook Pro Late 2011 with Marvericks is Slow and Choppy

Trevor

SORTED IT.
And this may be of use to anyone else having similar problems. Can an admin make this thread sticky? I found the following online, tried it - - and have been running without problems for several days now. The difference is fantastic!!!

Issue:
Clients logging into File Services over SMB with OS X 10.9 experience hanging connection upon login attempt.

Root Cause:
OS X 10.9 now utilizes a new SMB2 stack written by Apple. * Apple's SMB2 implementation is not compatible with many other SMB2 NAS products on the market today while Windows 7, 8, and 8.1 works just fine. * In short, its an Apple bug.

Workaround Option 1:
To force your connection to be SMB1, simply type cifs://servername instead of smb://servername when connecting to a Windows or NAS share. *This is by far easier and requires no real configuration changes.

Workaround Option 2:
To force all connections to be SMB1:
1. Open A terminal window
2. paste in the following line followed by the return key(should be all on one line): *
echo "[default]" >> ~/Library/Preferences/nsmb.conf; echo "smb_neg=smb1_only" >> ~/Library/Preferences/nsmb.conf

What the command does:
1. Creates a file called nsmb.conf *in your *home directory at the path ~/Library/Preferences/nsmb.conf.
2. Adds directives to force SMB connections to use the SMB1 protocol. *This is slower but stable.

How to remove the workaround:
1. Open a terminal window
2. paste in the following at the prompt and then hit the return button:
rm ~/Library/Preferences/nsmb.conf

Notes:
Its a good idea to restart your mac before trying to connect to your storage again. This will clear any hung SMB processes from previous attempts to connect to your storage before implementing this workaround.

These are all known issues ;-) I am glad you are sorted and got their in the end.
So you were having issues connecting to your personal NAS or your business File services or both ?

As i said we have been defaulting systems to SMB1 even with so called compatible SMB2 file shares on Windows server. We even tried to do server side tweaks to get it working right to no avail. This is Apple's issue, hell even Apple Enterprise support had to turn round and say please use SMB1 as "obviously there are configuration issues your end" which in a nut shell is not admitting to any problem with their highly broken SMBX.

Mavericks server is one serious car crash for file services as well.

Thanks, AgentX.
Yeah, it looks as if the NAS was a kind of red herring - I could never use it and stay on the network. But this workaround has made my life SO much more bearable, cos now I can use both NAS and the network freely.

I guess if you're of the techie persuasion, then this was easily solved.... but to a non-tech like me, it is, as you rightly say, a car-crash for any professional OS. Many thanks to you, and all that tried to help.

BD

I am a Consultant, System Admin & Engineer ;-)

As far as your NAS you could get it working if you bought and inexpensive router
ie. Router with NAS and Mac ethernet 1 plugged into it.
It would be isolated from main business network but you would have connectivity to it.