DHCP Issues after install of McAfee Agent 4.6.0

[rkallas]

I have a remote office that has had McAfee agent 4.6.0 deployed to a test group of both laptops and desktops.  The desktops seem to be having an issue getting DHCP addresses when they boot up, and have to be rebooted several times until they get one.  This has never been an issue with this site prior to the McAfee deployment.  And the laptops don't have this issue, only the desktops.

We are running Windows XP SP3 on the desktops and laptops. 

The site is getting DHCP from a server in our data center, so there is a relay set up on the router.  I did some sniffer captures and see the desktop doing a DHCP Discover, and getting a DHCP Offer from the DHCP server, but I never see the desktop doing the follow up DHCP Request.  I also see the DHCP server doing an ICMP ping to the IP address that the desktop had leased previously and no other devices are using this address.

So at this point I'm suspecting that something in the McAfee Agent firewall is blocking the rest of the DHCP communication, but I'm not certain where to start looking.

If anyone has experienced this and has a fix or suggestions on what troubleshooting steps to take, I'd greatly appreciate them.

Thanks,

Ray

[rkallas · Accepted solution]

Just an update.  We discovered that spanning-tree portfast wasn't enabled on some of the switch ports.  This was causing a timing issue with the DHCP process.  Once this was corrected, the PCs were able to get IP addresses.  This was reported as a McAfee issue in error.