Network Adapter Disabled on Disconnect

3

Recently I acquired a Raspberry Pi Zero, which I have been using via a USB cable for ethernet & power. Up until recently, all Windows adapters have been working properly, including when the Raspberry Pi was shut down and disconnected (I assure you that this issue has very little to do with the Pi itself).

Upon disonnecting the Raspberry Pi, Ethernet 4, aka the USB Ethernet/RNDIS Gadget is Disabled, permanently.

Furthermore, no USB disconnect sound is played through my computer, which is an oddity given it usually does.

I have tried:

  • Using ncpa.cpl to re-enable the adapter, to no avail. When clicking Enable, a message pops up saying Enabling... and then Enabled. - with no difference seen.
  • Using netsh to re-enable the adapter, to no avail.
  • Attempting to uninstall & reinstall the USB Ethernet/RNDIS Gadget from devmgmt.msc. Every time I attempt to do so, MMC stops responding.

What works:

  • Rebooting my laptop.

What I'm unable to do:

  • I'm unable to do a complete Network Reset (it shouldn't be an issue with it anyway) - I have WiFi networks that I wish to retain and other settings along with them.

Other notable effects of this behaviour:

  • My laptop is unable to go to sleep fully - the screen is off, yet the laptop remains active. (visible through external indicators).
  • (edit) It appears my laptop is unable to fully shutdown, also.

However, the ideal solution is to not have this happen in the first place. Originally, it worked as intended: the adapter simply disappeared upon disconnecting, and reappeared on reconnecting. A demonstration of the recent behaviour is shown below: Gadget, when connected

Gadget, when disconnected (recent behaviour)

Alex M.

Posted 2019-02-07T07:54:36.543

Reputation: 174

Disabling it prior to disconnecting it does stop the issue from occurring (and re-enabling and reconnecting works too. I'll look into the event log. Also, I ran sfc and it did find corrupted files... unfortunately I don't know if it has anything to do with my current issue, as it wasn't able to repair those files. – Alex M. – 2019-02-10T05:01:15.787

I can probably deal with having to disable & re-enable the device, yeah. – Alex M. – 2019-02-10T05:04:47.357

1I was able to run dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth and then sfc /scannow to corrupt all files. I'm going to confirm it worked + reboot my computer. – Alex M. – 2019-02-10T05:49:27.087

Can confirm that repairing corrupt files did nothing to fix the issue. Additionally, and I just noticed this, there's an "Unidentified network" label present in the tooltip of the Wifi icon (https://sevr.org/i/06c379f2-48d3-43b0-8874-f335317ed22a.png).

– Alex M. – 2019-02-10T06:15:53.880

The netsh enable/disable commands don't respond if the Pi was ejected without disabling the device first. – Alex M. – 2019-02-10T07:07:21.700

Answers

3

As a workaround solution from Device Manager (devmgmt.msc) navigate down to the Network Adapter in question (Ethernet/RNDIS Gadget), right click on it, and then select the Disable device option. enter image description here

With it disabled from Device Manager, now disconnect the Raspberry Pi per your usual process and just keep it disabled. Whenever you are ready to plug the Raspberry Pi back in and start using it, simply do so and when it's ready, right click on the and select the Enable device option.

Essentially you will. . .

  1. disable the device from Device Manager before you disconnect it, and then
  2. enable the device from Device Manager after you connect it back when you're ready to use it again.

More Troubleshooting. . .

Furthermore, from an elevated command prompt, run SFC /SCANNOW, let that run and finish, and reboot Windows. You might also look around Event Viewer application and system logs to see if you see anything relevant to the MMC/Device Manager freeze.

Pimp Juice IT

Posted 2019-02-07T07:54:36.543

Reputation: 29 425

Asked: 2019-02-07T07:54:36.543

Viewed: 453 times

Active: 2019-02-10T05:25:19.223