The specific operation cannot be performed due to the operation of another process.

[jayg30]

Hello,

I'm in need of help. Our company has a C353 that was purchased some time ago by one company (they wouldn't let us lease at the time) and then it was sold as part of a asset purchase to another company (the one I work for now). We just recently moved into a new building. Before that the machine worked fine for probably 3+ years that I know about. But now we have been getting strange behavior that nobody has been able to figure out. We have had Konica techs out probably 10+ times in the past 2 months. They are able to get the machine back functional by reloading the firmware, but it eventually happens again. The last time they replaced the hard drive and we thought that was going to solve it, but it only lasted a few weeks.

The problem starts with something simple, like today someone attempted to scan to email a set of 5 pages. The email goes through but when you attempt to open it you get "PDF is corrupt". Or in the past the machine would just lock up and become unresponsive to any screen presses. Either way, this results in a pretty useless copier. If you attempt to turn the machine off (power button, main power switch, and even pull power plug and let sit for 10 minutes) the machine comes back on but is even more useless. You can't access the administrative webpage, the utility/counter button doesn't do anything (so can't get to admin controls), and trying to go to the scanning screen gives this message;

"The specific operation cannot be performed due to the operation of another process. Please wait."

It's as if something is trying to complete, but if you look at the jobs and job history, it's all empty (and nothing is in there before turning the machine off either).

I don't feel like it is a network issue, although I have given it some thought. I just don't see how it could possible be the issue.

And like I said, if you reload the firmware it works again. I'm getting pretty tired of calling and having a Konica tech come out while we are down for 18-24 hours. I'm at a loss for what it could be. So I'm looking for help. Has anyone ever seen this? Questions/suggestions I should give to the Konica tech? Anyone want to offer to fix it (located in Claymont, DE)?

Thanks

[tervel12]

Perform a logical format of your hard drive. Then perform an All Data Clear and then re-enable the hard drive (All Data Clear disables the hard drive). Cycle the power when complete (and when prompted).

[jayg30]

Perform a logical format of your hard drive. Then perform an All Data Clear and then re-enable the hard drive (All Data Clear disables the hard drive). Cycle the power when complete (and when prompted).

Just to check, is this something I can do through admin panel? Or is this something the Tech will have to do?
They replaced the hard drive in the unit, wouldn't that have required a formatting already? Although when when I went in after they changed the HDD the settings were all still there. The only thing missing was the favorites on the scan screen. Perhaps they reloaded data from the old one.

Thanks.

[rrrohan]

What firmware level are you on? I had firmware cause lockup when trying to print from user box if the document was created on the previous firmware. Turned out that a firmware update had introduced that issue.

Could be ram fault. I'd try that next since ram is cheap these days.

Lastly I'd consider Mfp considering the fault is network releated.

I'd also suggest finding another tech, a single tech having 10 recalls is pretty embarrassing

[jayg30]

Ok, so today the tech came and we figured some stuff out I think.

The issue is so random it is hard to diagnose. But we were able to get it to corrupt on sending by email. So what I did was setup SMB and a public user box. When the corrupting occurred I scanned to the user box and it worked fine. I then scanned to SMB and email at the same time. The SMB pdf opens fine. The emailed pdf shows up as corrupt. The email does get sent however.

So it doesn't appear to be the printers fault. Would that sound like a correct conclusion?

Now I'm thinking it is a networking issue. But I'm not really sure what could be causing it. The email is getting sent, the pdf is just corrupted. Checking our Cisco switch, the port that the printer is hooked to shows no packet errors. I tried two different email providers (gmail and office365) and both caused the issue. I feel like this leaves only the router as potentially causing the problem.

[rrrohan]

What if you scan to email as a jpg or any other format? Does it still corrupt?

[copier tech]

If you say simply rewriting or upgrading the firmware rectifies the fault? this is a simple task you could do yourself, all you need is the memory card preloaded with the firmware, then simply plug this into the copier, turn it on & press update!
i'm only suggesting this as i'm guessing you don't want to spend money on this old machine on parts & call outs etc?

[jayg30]

Good suggestion, I'm going to try that. I was going to try scanning as jpeg just a second ago, but once again the issue has disappeared and everything is going through just fine. If I get it to stop working again then I'll test.

[jayg30]

If you say simply rewriting or upgrading the firmware rectifies the fault? this is a simple task you could do yourself, all you need is the memory card preloaded with the firmware, then simply plug this into the copier, turn it on & press update!
i'm only suggesting this as i'm guessing you don't want to spend money on this old machine on parts & call outs etc?

Yes that is correct, when the device enters this state of not responding because it is waiting for "another process" the way it has been rectified in the past was to reload the firmware. It also seems now that if left alone for a random amount of time it does fix itself. However, I'm not a technician. I work for the company that owns this machine now. I handle all the IT and my degree is in computer engineering. I'm sure I could reload the firmware, but I don't have the firmware unfortunately. So if we can't get it to come back to a functional state, I have to wait for it to fix itself and enter a service call in case it doesn't fix itself so they can reload the firmware.

However, the underlying cause of the problem is something I'd like to solve so that people don't end up with a printer they can't use. Which is what I'm working on now from my end (networking side).

[emujo]

If it only happens when sending mail, you could try setting up a gmail account and testing the MFP on the new carrier. If the failures continue, it would point me closer to a problem with the MFP. Another thing that causes issues is a connectivity issue caused by running a 1 gig network and not having the CAT5e or better cabling to the MFP. The MPF only supports up to 100M. Emujo