Another BSOD - MRVW13B.sys responsible

[Alex808]

Hey guys,

this has been happening for over a year now, and after many many tweaks to uTorrent some of which have helped a little bit, I am still getting regular BSODs in Vista when uTorrent is running.

- Network card is a Wireless NETGEAR WG311v3 54Mbps PCI Adapter

- It only happens when uTorrent is running

- Crash dump analysis always points to the MRVW13B.sys which is the wireless card driver that Vista assigns it

- I have updated to the latest card drivers

- My chipset (P35/G33) drivers are up to date

- BIOS is up to date (crashes have happened since my chipset and BIOS were out of date but updating hasnt helped)

- The crashing can 'sometimes' be made more frequent if I run something like WMP or Winamp at the same time. I say 'sometimes' as I cannot replicate the problem consistently, but Vista will not BSOD as quickly if left to its own devices (although it will eventually)

- BSODs seem to be happening whilst there is more traffic coming through the application (makes sense being the network driver falling over)

- I started out with uTorrent default settings for a 2Mb line as I didn't want to push it to the next option, 10Mb as I have an 8Mb line. I have since tweaked my settings from various tutorials on the net, including information I have found here.

Things that I have changed in the application:

- I have updated my tcpip.sys correctly

- I have changed my net.max_halfopen connections to 100

- I have changed my net.outgoing_port to 50

- I have changed my net.wsaevents to 25

My current settings are:

- Set to port forward

- Enable NAT-PMP port mapping

- Global Upload Rate = 70kB/s

- Global Download Rate = 0

- Global Max number of connections = 450 (lowered several times from around 800 which caused crashing more frequently)

- Max number of connected peers = 50 (again, lowered from a higher figure)

- Number of upload slots per torrent = 15 (lowered from a higher figure)

- Enable DHT Network

- Enable DHT for net torrents

- Enable Local Peer Discovery

- Ask tracker for scrape info

- Enable Peer Exchange

- Forced outgoing protocol encryption with ticked 'Allow incoming legacy connections'

- Max number of active torrents and active downloads are both set to 15

My download speeds are fine really... I might be able to tweak a bit more, but currently this is as stable as I have gotten uTorrent in Vista. I am sure its my network card doing this but I haven't got a spare to test... I could always try plugging my PC direct into my router (removing the wireless factor) but I need to acquire some more CAT5 as I have given it away over the years as everyone tends to collect it and never end up using it lol.

I'm not an expert in uTorrent. I work 3rd level support in MS and Citrix etc so I can trouble shoot and follow instructions fine, but my settings are basically based upon several different uTorrent speed / config tutorials which I've tuned down due to higher rates of crashes...

If anyone can shed any light, or suggest any new settings / see anything way off in my settings, I would appreciate very much being pointed in the right direction...

I have a suspicion that my network card isn't handling high connections... BSODs continually point to the network driver in every dump analysis I run through the dumpchk.exe util from sysinternals. After googling around, the MRVW13B.sys looks like a common file which Vista assigns to network cards but I'm not sure... there seems to be ways of forcing the cards to use the card manufacturers drivers instead (speculation in a few unfinished forum posts I found) but every time time I try to install or re-install the driver (have even done the old device manager > delete driver > then re-install from .dll's) I keep getting the MRVW13B.sys one back (although I might be wrong with my guess above and this could be working as expected).

Any help would be fantastic. I love uTorrent, and I'll be damned if this problem will pester me any longer!

regards,

Alex

[Firon]

You might have no choice but to use a different wireless adapter. Wireless adapters generally can't handle as many connections as wired, but it varies among chipsets.

See if connecting to the router wired resolves the crashes once you acquire some CAT5

[Alex808]

Thanks Firon, I had a feeling it would be something along those lines. I will try hard wired. Don't suppose you are aware of any really decent wireless cards?? The one I have is only a cheapy PCI jobby, although I would still be taking a gamble buying a newer more expensive card if it didn't fix the problem.

Cheers

Alex

[Firon]

Atheros-based cards are fairly decent.

[Switeck]

- I started out with uTorrent default settings for a 2Mb line as I didn't want to push it to the next option, 10Mb as I have an 8Mb line.

Sadly, you do not have an 8 megabit/second or even 2 megabit/second UPLOAD line.

Your line is highly asymmetric and probably has 1 megabit/second upload speed at most.

What's your REAL upload speed for your connection?

2nd link in my signature matches uTorrent settings to upload speed max.

FYI: net.max_halfopen should not be more than 80% the max limit allowed in tcpip.sys and is BEST if not set over 8 unless you are on a very fast line running many torrents at once...and NOT using wireless.

[Alex808]

Switeck thanks for your reply, I realised that shortly after posting that uTorrent is meant to be set by the max UPLOAD speed... DOH! Thanks for the pointer though.

I now have a 16mb connection with a 1mb upload, and guess what? It still crashed BUT when I moved to Vista 64 Ultimate, the problem hasn't happened once... I simply do not get the MRVW13B.sys BSOD, ever

Thanks for your help guys. Wanted to post this in case some other poor soul gets this on 32bit Vista

Alex

[Switeck]

Make sure your total upload slots never exceeds about 1/3 your upload speed.

So if you're uploading at 90 KB/sec, you shouldn't use more than 30 upload slots.

This is not per-torrent, this is globally.

So if you have 10 active torrents, that's only 3 upload slots PER torrent.