zup peeps,

every now and then windows 2000 will decide to dissable the network card and cause havoc on the network. the drivers installed are the correct drivers. I've also seen this happen on other systems running 2k pro and 2k server.

any ideas on why and how to prevent it from happening again.

thanks

Defective hardware.

I have a stack of PCs, all the same make/models, and the NICs keep malfunctioning.

I loaded the built-in drivers and the vendor provided drivers. It didn't help one bit.

Then again, you could try the same NIC at another PC( if it's not integrated into the motherboard ) and see what happens.

Keep us posted.

well this doesnt happen ALL the time. Mostly just once in a blue moon, or just once and then work forever (so far). Any other ideas?

Try another PSU. A lot of such hardware issues are caused by a faulty power supply.