Windows Developer Power Tools

15.2 Identifying TCP Port and Endpoint Issues with TCPView

Conflicts between applications demanding the same TCP/IP port are frustrating, especially if you’re working on a system shared with other development teams. Inter-team communication might be lacking, and teams might not clearly lay out their configuration requirements. The same thing happens all too frequently in production systems, where administrative staff miss application requirements or misconfigure the applications.

Tracking down these conflicts can be an irritating task, unless you have Sysinternals’s TCPView to ease the way. TCPView shows all TCP communications to and from a particular system. It lets you immediately identify port conflicts and isolate which processes are demanding those ports. TCPView can also help you identify unexpected TCP communications, such as those on a system infected with a Trojan virus.

TCPView at a Glance
Tool	TCPView
Version covered	2.40
Home page	http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/TcpView.html
Power Tools page	http://www.windevpowertools.com/tools/71
Summary	Elegant, simple tool for identifying potential port conflicts and other TCP/IP problems
License type	Freeware; can’t be redistributed without specific permission, can’t use for customer support (see web site for details)
Online resources	Forum
Related tools in this book	Filemon, Regmon, ProcessExplorer

Getting Started

TCPView, like most Sysinternals ...