Scenario: Windows 2008 R1 AD Domain, Windows 2003 ADC, ISA 2006 proxy, Windows XP, Windows 7 Clients.

I had couple of other posts related to the same topic in the past. Last week, March 2009, we almost ran into a solution which we expected as a permanent resolution for the annoying “Additional log on information may be required, click here to open the browser” message. However, immediately after couple of days without issues, this message started popping up, especially with 64bit Windows 7 Professional clients (I have one)

This time rather than spending our whole attention towards the client, we tried to do troubleshooting for the live connection and the detailing pans suggested we should sign up with the ISP for this network. Because we are behind ISA server proxy, we assumed the connection assess the same as a re-direction.

We had ISA from last five years and right now running ISA 2006. However we never enabled the auto discovery method for ISA and finally after spending few minutes and with the help of a document from isaserver.org we managed to get the wpad work fine for us.

However, other than my particular box, rest three test boxes running both 64bit and 32 bit clients stopped receiving “Additional log on information may be required” or “abc.com no internet access” status messages. In order to re-produce the scenarios which caused my system to have persistent error messages, I opted for a fresh installation of the OS and started creating manual restore points (how to?)

Post-installation activities

Re-joined my box with previous hostname

Installed ISA firewall client<>’No more You may require additional log on information or the yellow triangle with “abc.com no internet access”

Installed Avast free antivirus<> No problems yet (Many posts refer about antivirus programs causing the status/error messages)

Installed ZoneAlarm free firewall<>Better manageable than built-in firewall, still no error messages.

As writing this post on 20th March 2010, I am yet to receive any error messages about the connectivity. Following are the software I am yet to install which MAY cause problems with the connectivity

• Java VirtualBOX
• VMWare free player

Right now I am too busy to install the virtual machines, however too eager to assess what would happen once after I will finally install them. Please come back and read to know whether one of the installations specifically causes the most annoying error messages you would come across with your Windows 7 network connections!

Even though while connected to the LAN physically I don’t get warning/error messages, while establishing a PPTP connection from home to work, I do receive “Additional log on information may be required” followed by “click here to open the browser” messages.

Update 20.March.2010 afternoon session

Installed VMWare free player (latest edition). Everything works fine. “Additional log on information may be required” message still appears along with the hated yellow triangle only when the cable is physically detached and attached back. Nothing (restarting “Network Location Awareness”) clears the status message and a forced restart required to clear the message.

Uninstalled VMWare player, re-produced the situation to confirm it was not the VMWare networking components causing the error

Found a latest driver for the NIC from BroadCom site itself as HP site provided NIC drivers are rejected by Microsoft stating the drivers supplied by Microsoft being the latest dated to 26th April 2009. The drivers from BroadCom is dated 08th of June 2009 and Windows agreed to upgrade the drivers.

By virtue or out of curiosity disabled the option “Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power” under Power Management node.

Re-installed VMWare free player, restarted the machine. Everything seems working fine.

Unplugged the cable, plugged back and bingo, within few seconds the network connection established without throwing any error messages!

Does it mean we are finally dealt with more than a month-long painful exercises to find a solution for this annoyance? Wait, let us wait another couple of days. Last time when we “found” such a solution, the error messages started appearing after 2-3 days…

Minor update (21st March 2010)

Umm I didn’t have to wait for 2-3 days! Now, the latest problem which triggers a hated yellow triangle tightly related with the power saving “enhancement”. After the fresh installation the power options were not altered to suit my current working atmosphere and the machine was having default settings, in which, even while the power is plugged in the system was asked to go into sleep mode after 5-10 minutes of idle time.

Once awaken, the system tries “hard” to re-initiate the network, eventually fails to authenticate(?) something, something, brings back the favorite(?) yellow triangle and the love message “Additional log on information may be required”

The only solution I had was to set up never to allow the PC to enter into the sleep mode while power is plugged in! Seems it is working perfectly (I spent around 12 minutes for lunch and when returned the network connection was still intact without the yellow triangle or error message(s))