Blocking of certain file downloads
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            by Philip Fourie
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        Published on 2009-10-21T14:06:00Z
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            2010/06/13
            12:02 UTC
        
        
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I have a problem where I cannot completely download a certain file from a server.
The file is 1.9MB in size but only 68% is downloaded and then it hangs.
I tried and these cases, which failed:
- Downloaded the file with HTTP
- Downloaded the file with FTP
- Moved the file to different FTP and web servers behind the ISA firewall
- Tried with IIS 6.0 & IIS 7.0
- Multiple download clients. Which included FireFox, FileZilla (on Windows) and wget (on Linux)
This worked:
- Downloading other files from the same location on the server. Both bigger and smaller and in size than the original. FTP and HTTP worked.
- Earlier version of this file (.DLL) works. It is as if the content of this file has an influence on this file being served.
Network architecture:
Client Machine -> Internet (ISP) -> ISA Server -> IIS 7.0
The only constants are the ISP, Cisco router and the ISA server.  Is it possible that something is rejecting the download because of the contents of the file?
 
I am hoping ISA is the culprit...  I am not a ISA expert is there somewhere I can look to establish if it is indeed ISA causing this?
Update:
- Splitting the file into two parts with a hex editor results in one half of the file being served correctly and the other part not.
- Zipping the file results in the file being downloaded successfully. However this is not an option for this particular scenario.
- Renaming the file and its extension also doesn't work.
Update 2009/10/22:
It does NOT seems to be ISA that is causing this problem. We connected a laptop (running IIS) on an available public IP and still the file download to 68% before it hanged. The two remaining components are the ISP and the Cisco 800 series router. Anyone knows about an issue on the router perhaps?
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