Scheduled Tasks Fail

We have a strange situation with one of our servers running Win2K SP4. Any
scheduled task that it tries to run hangs, showing "running" in the status.
At the same time, this error appears in the system log:

Event Type: Information
Event Source: Application Popup
Event Category: None
Event ID: 26
Description:
Application popup: CMD.EXE - Application Error : The application failed to
initialize properly (0xc0000142). Click on OK to terminate the application.

The app in this example is CMD, but the application doesn't matter. We also
get the error when launching IExplore.exe. The batch files and apps we have
tested as scheduled items all run fine when launched manually.

So far on researching this problem, most of the solutions are only
applicable to specific programs and not scheduled tasks. I did find two
items, but neither of the problems mentioned (heap size too small and
registry settings related to code page) exist on this server.

At the point, we're open to any ideas people might have.

Thanks,
Brian

 

I should add that we have tried running the tasks as different admin
accounts and the task scheduler service is running as the system account.

Brian

 

"Brian" <reply2me@thenewsgroup> wrote in message
news:ugvxt1xzJHA.1092@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
> We have a strange situation with one of our servers running Win2K SP4. Any
> scheduled task that it tries to run hangs, showing "running" in the
> status. At the same time, this error appears in the system log:
>
> Event Type: Information
> Event Source: Application Popup
> Event Category: None
> Event ID: 26
> Description:
> Application popup: CMD.EXE - Application Error : The application failed to
> initialize properly (0xc0000142). Click on OK to terminate the
> application.
>
> The app in this example is CMD, but the application doesn't matter. We
> also get the error when launching IExplore.exe. The batch files and apps
> we have tested as scheduled items all run fine when launched manually.
>
> So far on researching this problem, most of the solutions are only
> applicable to specific programs and not scheduled tasks. I did find two
> items, but neither of the problems mentioned (heap size too small and
> registry settings related to code page) exist on this server.
>
> At the point, we're open to any ideas people might have.
>
> Thanks,
> Brian

What do you get when you schedule the following batch file?
@echo off
echo %date% %time% %UserName% >> c:\test.txt

 

"Pegasus [MVP]" <news@microsoft.com> wrote
> What do you get when you schedule the following batch file?
> @echo off
> echo %date% %time% %UserName% >> c:\test.txt

Good idea to see if the application will echo the error message to the file.
However it failed in application CMD, the same way as the others. The
test.txt never appears, so the task must be failing before it executes
anything.

Thanks,
Brian

 

"Brian" <reply2me@thenewsgroup> wrote in message
news:%23jpTI40zJHA.4412@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
> "Pegasus [MVP]" <news@microsoft.com> wrote
>> What do you get when you schedule the following batch file?
>> @echo off
>> echo %date% %time% %UserName% >> c:\test.txt
>
> Good idea to see if the application will echo the error message to the
> file. However it failed in application CMD, the same way as the others.
> The test.txt never appears, so the task must be failing before it executes
> anything.
>
> Thanks,
> Brian

Surfing Google suggests that the problem could be caused by ZoneAlarm and/or
a Trojan. Does it persist when launching a scheduled task while in Safe
Mode?

 

"Pegasus [MVP]" <news@microsoft.com> wrote
> Surfing Google suggests that the problem could be caused by ZoneAlarm
> and/or a Trojan. Does it persist when launching a scheduled task while in
> Safe Mode?

Defintely not zone alarm as we use Symantec. As for safe mode, since this a
production server, we'll have to try it on the weekend.

Thanks,
Brian

 

"Pegasus [MVP]" <news@microsoft.com> wrote
> Does it persist when launching a scheduled task while in Safe Mode?

It worked in safe mode and then when I restarted the server in normal mode
it also worked. Go figure. There was probably some extenuating
circumstances. We'll see over time if the problem stays gone.

Thanks for your help.

Brian