TIME_WAIT from netstat

Question

We have two 2012 window servers, let’s call them server A and server B. When server A was trying to connect server B, we found there were RPC error and TIME_WAIT from server B. We have tried change TcpTimeWaitDelay to 60 in registry and rebooted server B. But the problem still existed. Please help advise.

Answer 1

Hi,

Thanks for posting in Q&A platform.

TCP TIME_WAIT is a normal TCP protocol operation, it means after delivering the last FIN-ACK, client side will wait for double maximum segment life (MSL) Time to pass to be sure the remote TCP received the acknowledgement of its connection termination request. By default, MSL is 2 minutes. For the maximum, it can stay in TIME_WAIT for 4 minutes known as two MSL.

Please refer to the following screenshot.

From Network perspective, TCP TIME_WAIT status is just a normal behavior that after closing the session, TCP stack will hold the high port for little more time to ensure the other side receive the last FIN-ACK packet and no more data will be received in this conversation. TIME_WAIT is not the problem. I would suggest you focus on RPC error for this issue.

For RPC error, common causes of RPC errors include:

Errors resolving a DNS or NetBIOS name.
The RPC service or related services may not be running.
number of connectivity Problems with network connectivity.
File and printer sharing is not enabled.

To narrow down the issue, I would suggest collect network traffic for further troubleshooting.

Please understand, analysis of network traffic is beyond our forum support level. I would suggest you open a case with Microsoft where more in-depth investigation can be done so that you would get a more satisfying explanation to this question.

You may find phone number for your region accordingly from the link below:

Global Customer Service phone numbers
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/gp/customer-service-phone-numbers

Best Regards,
Sunny

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