Connection time out to Oracle10G, XP-Pro

I am running Oracle 10G on WinXP Pro 2.8G CPU 1G Memory New machine, clean install. I have used Oracle in all capacities for 15 years, but have not seen this before.

I am getting an Oracle Connection time-out after 15-30 minutes with no activity on the database. It occurs with Toad and with SQL*Plus and Forms.

Th XP Host machine has a fixed IP, and I am connecting from another machine that has an IP assigned by my local router. The two machines are actually only a few feet apart.

I worked around it in Forms by adding a timer to select 1 from dual every ten minutes. The connection is never lost with this hack.

I at first assumed it was a new parameter setting and I would figure out
what to do about it in due time, then get rid of the timer. However, I

can't find any reference to a timer or a param that might cause this behavior.

I am running MS Firewall on the XP box, but I have tested this with the

firewall disabled and the timeouts still occur.

This is what TOAD reports:
  The following error has occurred: ORA-12571:   TNS:packet writer failure

Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated!

Thanks Bob Treumann, Minnesota Received on Thu May 05 2005 - 20:39:22 CDT