Common causes of data corruption

Hardware or Network Issues

• Aging, damaged, or faulty components
• Loose or improperly installed cards, connectors, or terminators
• Bent pins
• Examples: network cards (NICs), cables, routers, hubs, switches, motherboards, memory chips
• WiFi connections aren’t supported

Test network performance

• PING servername -l 1800
  Sends 4 packets of 1800 bytes.
• PING servername -t
  Sends continuous small packets until you press Ctrl+C. Lost packets indicate data loss.
• PING servername -t -l 1800
  Sends continuous 1800-byte packets until Ctrl+C. Lost packets indicate timing issues.

Performance guidelines

• 1 ms is ideal
• 20 ms will impact performance
• 40 ms is unacceptable

Failing or Degraded Storage Media

• Hard drives, CDs/DVDs, tape drives, USB drives, cloud storage
• Bad sectors can appear over time due to wear or damage
• Modern drives use spare sectors to replace bad ones, but data in bad sectors will be lost

Power Issues

• Fluctuations, spikes, surges, interruptions
• Examples: UPS delays, interference from motors or transformers, poor electrical wiring
• Even physical interference (for example, an Ethernet cable under a chair wheel) can cause corruption

Malicious Software (Malware)

• Viruses, worms, Trojans, ransomware
• Ransomware encrypts files and often provides unusable decryption keys

Operating System or Program Bugs

• This includes third-party programs and outdated network card drivers
• New installations or updates can introduce unknown bugs

Interference from Other Software

• Backup software or shadow copying can lock files
• Other programs use the same port or consume more bandwidth
• Virtual machines sharing resources can cause interruptions

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How to Rebuild Key Files in Sage 100
How to use the *UFAR utility to rebuild files
How to use the *UFAC utility to check damaged files