Any attempt to reboot this machine ends with it hanging on a gray screen after the Dialog Box "Windows is now shutting down." The dialog box disappears and you're left with a gray screen. The machine is pingable, but no other services are available, ie: rdp or psexec. The last entry in the event viewer is: 6006: The Event Log Service Was Stopped After that it just hangs, i hooked tight vnc up to it to see what the gui looked like and the vnc session will stay active as long as the gray screen is up. Does anyone know what may be causing this server to not come all the way down? I installed vnc expecting to see a dialog box asking me to save something or end process on something but it goes all the way through the shutdown sequence and then just hangs on a gray screen.

please read this article. How To Troubleshoot Shutdown Problems in Windows Server 2003 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324268

Hi the200mg, Thanks for post here. In addiction with troubleshooting steps that Roy provided, based on my experience that incorrectly installed driver software would mostly cause shutdown issue , so you might also like to detect it by using SIGVERIF.exe first. Here is the workaround: 1. Click Start, Run, SIGVERIF.EXE 2. Click Advanced 3. Click "Look for other files that are not digitally signed" 4. In the "Look in this folder" box enter c:\windows\system32\drivers 5. Click okay 6. Click start 7. When complete click start, run, SIGVERIF.TXT The SIGVERIF.TXT logfile will contain all the drivers on the system. 8. Make note of UNSIGNED drivers AND drivers that are NOT signed by NT5.CAT, NT5INF.CAT, SP1.CAT, SP2.CAT, SP3.CAT. These are the 3rd party drivers on the system. A 3rd party driver that is signed does not mean it cannot cause problems 9. Boot to recovery console and rename all of these drivers. Important to do this from recovery console so that if something happens it is easy to get the machine back to where it was so it boots. Some drivers like mass storage drivers cannot be renamed since we need those to boot. If you get down to this is the only driver left that may be an issue check for updated versions of the mass storage driver 10. Boot up and login. You may receive some errors due to certain files being renamed. Ignore for now. This is a test 11. Once you are logged in try to shut down. If it works then the process is basically adding in each driver one by one until you find the driver that is causing the shutdown problems. 12. Once you find the driver try to find a updated version or switch to the inbox driver for the device Note: Windows Update contains updated drivers that come from manufacturers so they are not necessarily Microsoft drivers. Hope that’s helpful. Tiger LiPlease remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.