Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Uninstalling Cisco VPN client kills internet access

Symptoms

On starting the computer the computers internet access will work normally for a short period of time. Then access to normal websites will be down. Access to https sites, internet application such as instant messaging and e-mail are still accessible.

Cause

Uninstalling Cisco VPN 4.0 client doesn't fully uninstall hidden Zone Alarm Firewall which causes a block in port 80 on the computer.

Resolution

Cisco VPN client version 4.0 includes firewall functionality from Zone Labs Inc. It is possible that a failed Zone Labs uninstall left an incorrect value in the systems registry and must be changed. To resolve the problem follow these steps.

Caution This procedure contains information about editing the registry. Before you edit the registry, make sure you understand how to restore it if a problem occurs.

Step 1 Restart the computer and when your computer screen displays the startup message like "Starting Windows..." and a progress bar at the bottom of the screen, press the F8 key on the keyboard. This should display an advanced options screen.

Step 2 At the advanced options screen select "Safe Mode" as a startup method.

Step 3 If prompted, login to the PC once it is booted (you must have Administrator rights to login in Safe Mode).

Step 4 Click Start > Run and type "regedit" in the Open: box (without the quotes) and click OK. This launches the Windows registry editor.

Step 5 In the registry editor, browse to the following path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\vsdatant and select the Start parameter in the right pane.

Step 6 Right-click Start and select Modify. In the Value data: field enter the number 3.

Step 7 Click OK and exit the registry editor.

Step 8 Restart the computer and boot normally; the problem should be resolved.

Related Links

Release Notes for VPN Client, Release 4.0.1

Author notes


I spent a considerate amount of time looking for a resolution to this problem..I post it up here in hopes that it helps someone else a little easier.  If it helps you please post a comment to let me know.

# Tuesday, July 10 2007 at 2:03 PM | Comments [17]
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Saturday, August 11, 2007 1:45:41 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Ralph,

Thank you very much for your posting online regarding the cisco VPN client killing the HTTP access. I had been struggling to fix the issue for over 2 days and and pretty much tried every ting from reinitializing winsock , reinstalling TCP/IP stack and to reinstall windows SP 2. Corporate help desk and techs were completely bummed at this strange issue. I was just about to format the damn disk, when I stumbled upon your page and the fix was right on the money.

You are the best

Regards

Sumeet
Sumeet Gohri
Saturday, August 11, 2007 1:55:23 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
That's awesome...thanks for replying and letting me know.

That little bugger was a nightmare for me. My IT guys threw their hands in the air and gave up on it. I found that resolution buried on a discussion thread of the problem after a couple of days of looking.

Hopefully with me posting this it was easier to find on Google.

By the way I have since installed Cisco VPN client version 5.x and have had no problems.

Thanks for writing,

Ralph
Ralph Whitbeck
Monday, September 24, 2007 10:23:05 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Hello Ralph,

It was great to have this solution on your website. It saved me, even though before I found it, I tried a lot of things. Finally your solution worked. Thanks a lot !!!

Cheers,
Beta
Beta
Monday, September 24, 2007 10:28:41 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Great! Glad it helped you out.
Ralph Whitbeck
Monday, September 24, 2007 2:46:52 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Thanks, solved my problem too. I spent hours trying to find out what the problem was. narrowed it down to port 80 and was able to google your page.
max
Tuesday, September 25, 2007 5:54:17 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Man, you are right, thanks for your information.

My case is:

only can access internet in 10 mins after system bootup, visit http will be blocked, but no problem with others protocol(https, ftp).


I try to uninstall the cisco vpn & reinstall cisco, does not work.

try to enable/disable the cisco firewall, does not work.

Such a xxxx issues of cisco.


WenZhi Chen
Saturday, November 17, 2007 6:49:50 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Thanks for much for posting this fix. I tried for 3 days researching the cause and everyone told me to reinstall Windows XP. I did your fix and all is well. Thanks again!
Craig
Tuesday, November 27, 2007 1:56:53 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Great hint Ralph!!! Congratulations!! You saved my laptop from being formatted once again.

I spent this last month installing and uninstalling the Cisco VPN Client to find out what was really the problem. Prior to that I had removed all antivirus and firewall software installed and bought a new antivirus solution.

Thank you,
Nikos
Nikos
Tuesday, November 27, 2007 2:10:24 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
I am glad this is helping so many people out.
Ralph Whitbeck
Thursday, November 29, 2007 5:24:25 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Thanks a billion!! My IT guys tried everything over the phone with no luck, they wanted me to ship them my desktop to re image the drive!
Moe
Friday, November 30, 2007 3:09:11 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Found this on a google search, http was not available after uninstalling Client version 5. Like others the next step was to reformat my entire machine. This worked! Thanks!
Dave
Thursday, December 06, 2007 11:00:09 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Hail to the king! I've almost reinstall my os.
GoostleeK
Tuesday, February 05, 2008 5:16:14 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
I was about to give up on this one. I had uninstalled one version of Cisco VPN client in order to reinstall a newer version. No problems uninstalling or installing the new version. I used the new VPN client to work from home for an entire day with no trouble. Didn't notice the HTTP block until about 10 minutes into browsing the next day. Thought the modem and router needed rebooting, but the other PCs in the house were working fine. Thought my wireless card wasn't working, but email, FTP, HTTPS, and Ping were showing normal results. Uninstalled the new VPN version and went from 10 minutes of HTTP access to NONE! Resinstalled the new version and got my 10 minutes of HTTP access back. Tried bypassing my Firewall, no luck. Tried turning off any antivirus software, no luck. The ONLY thing that gave me a temporary fix was to log into work using the VPN software and then log back out. That fixed my problem, but only for as long as I did NOT reboot. Once I had to reboot for any reason, I was back to 10 minutes of HTTP access. Told a friend about my problem and he found this article. I knew as soon as I read the description that the fix was going to work. The symptoms matched mine exactly. Applied the fix in about 60 seconds, rebooted and haven't had the problem since. I work for a large corporation that just rolled out this new version of VPN. I wonder how many other people will experience this same frustration before they come across this! Thanks for posting this article! Saved me from taking what would have been completely unnecessary measures, all for nothing!
Mike
Tuesday, February 05, 2008 8:15:22 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Hey Mike thanks for writing that really made my day.
Ralph Whitbeck
Monday, February 11, 2008 9:24:16 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
You are a life saver Ralph. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I worked on this problem for the last four days straight. HTTP traffic stoped exactly 10 minutes after a boot. My problems started after I noticed an install of Panda Internet Security disabled my VPN client. After reinstall of the client I had this problem. Tried everything over the last 4 days. Repare install of windows, restore Ghost backups, disable all startup and services, etc. I have spent hours searching MS and CISCO sites when I finally resorted to general searches using Google. At last I used the right search words and found your information. It works!
Chuck Arney
Monday, February 18, 2008 9:06:20 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
Finally! Someone had a fix. I knew it was the VPN client, but did not know about the registry key.

Thanks for saving me from a XP reinstall!
Greg T.
Monday, September 22, 2008 6:12:35 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
Brilliant solution, ralph! I had struggled with this problem for almost a half year, and finally solve the problem.
One tricky way that I could connect to internet even with this problem was connect to typical VPN server. I guess connect to a VPN server make a change of enable/disable the configuration of XXX firewall.
Thanks a huge. My lucky key word to get this article was '10 minutes cisco vpn http'. ;)
Charlie
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