Topic: mysqld.exe Crashes When Run As A Service

[Brian White]

After installing the most recent batch of security updates from Microsoft, MySQL 5.1.30 from Apache Lounge crashed whenever a connection either from a web server or MySQL Administrator or Query Browser was made to the database. I have been using it since shortly after Steffen compiled it for us without any problems. Only the service was affected. I didn't have a problem if I ran mysqld.exe from the command line (i.e. mysqld --standalone --console). So, I changed the service account to a real user with administrative permissions rather than Local System and the problem was resolved. I know that MS made several fixes regarding permission elevation; but I don't know exactly what in MySQL is incompatible with the latest updates. Hopefully this will stop someone else from spending as much time as I did trying to find and fix the problem.

Background: "Server" runs Windows XP SP3. KBs applied: KB961373, KB960803, KB959426, KB956572, KB952004, KB923561.

[James Blond]

Does the service run correct? Often there is a wrong path in the registry or wrong name. What is in the windows event log about that?

[Brian White]

It ran perfectly for months. The system has been rebooted many times since last December. The only change was the addition of the Microsoft KBs I listed. I can replicate the problem by changing the service account back to Local System and restarting.

I get:

Faulting application mysqld.exe, version 0.0.0.0, faulting module mysqld.exe, version 0.0.0.0, fault address 0x0020c6f8.

in the Application event log.

The basic "boilerplate" text (without a stack trace) is the only thing that shows up in the MySQL error log.

To cause or fix the error. I make no changes other than to Log On tab of services.

And I'm sorry if this was not clear in the original post; but the service starts properly. It crashes only when a connection is made. When I was investigating, I let it run for 30-minutes or so without incident; then it crashed the moment I hit connect in Query Browser. The service is definitely starting and only crashing when it is being used.

[tdonovan]

hmmmm.... I can't seem to reproduce this problem on Windows XP SP3, even with the recent MS updates installed.
I checked that the six updates that you mentioned were installed - and they all were.
KB956572 sounds like it could potentially cause Local-System service problems, but MySQL 5.1.30 runs fine for me as a service using Local-System without any problems. Making connections and performing SELECTs works fine.

Is there anything about how you installed the service, or where your data is, or anything else you can think of that might be different on your system?
Have you changed anything in my.ini?

-tom-

[Brian White]

The only thing that is slightly unusual is that I use InnoDB as my default storage engine. The last change to my.ini was on 2/15 when I reduced the size of the query cache. "Uptime /S" shows the system was rebooted twice since then. Generally, the configuration of the system is fairly static. I only access it to perform Windows Updates or when there are new versions of Apache/MySQL/PHP/etc. All MySQL files are in the default location. The path to the executable shown on services is:

C:\MySQL\bin\mysqld --defaults-file=C:\MySQL\my.ini MySQL

I tried Uninstalling and reinstalling the service but the issues still persisted. The only thing that corrects it seems to be changing the service account. My suspicion is that there is a file or registry entry that the Local System account isn't allowed to read or write any more. I've read and re-read KB956572 but I'm stumped regarding the best way to investigate the issue. I can't use their diagnostic method shown since the patch is already installed.

Here's the minimal information that appears in the MySQL error log: