Symptoms
Consider the following scenario:
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You have a Windows 7-based or Windows Server 2008 R2-based computer that uses a third-party Wireless Wide Area Network (WWAN) adapter.
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You plug a SIM card into the WWAN adapter and then connect to the network by using the adapter.
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You put the computer into sleep mode (system power state S3).
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You remove the SIM card from the WWAN adapter, and then you plug the SIM card back into the adapter.
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You resume the computer from sleep mode.
In this scenario, Windows does not load the WWAN adapter driver. Additionally, you receive an error message that resembles the following:
Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware because a previous instance of the device driver is still in memory.
Cause
This issue occurs because Network Driver Interface Specification (NDIS) blocks the device driver when the computer enters sleep mode.
Resolution
Hotfix information
To fix this issue, install the update that is described in Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB) article 2719857. For more information about KB 2719857, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
2719857 You cannot use an USB RNDIS device to connect to a 3G or 4G network in Windows 7 or in Windows Server 2008 R2
Prerequisites
To apply this hotfix, you must be running Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) or Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1. For more information about how to obtain a Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 service pack, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
976932Information about Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 and for Windows Server 2008 R2
Status
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.
More Information
For more information about sleep states, go to the following Microsoft website:
General information about sleep states for Wake On LANFor more information about software update terminology, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
824684Description of the standard terminology that is used to describe Microsoft software updates
