I have a G5 Xserve that I just rebuilt running 10.4.8, it is attached to AD and MAC and PC users are connecting with no problems. The main issue is I keep getting "SMBD Processes" and each one takes up a small amount of RAM. I believe that these are created when a Windows box connects to the server but they do not get released, so I keep getting more and more. After about 24 hours I have 100-150 and are just about out of RAM! I have to restart or it end up crashing the system. The system logs do not indicate anything is going on. Any ideas?

In the short run is there an automated utility that I can schedule to start and stop the Windows service, as when I do that all the SMBD processes disappear?

I have another G5 Xserve running 10.4.7 and it does not have this same issue, could it be hardware related? say an issue with the nic or other hardware. I was thinking of switching out all the hardware and see if it still occurs.

smbd is just the samba file share daemon, are people mounting the server drives when they connect?

Anyway there are alot of bugs in 10.4.8 so you might want to reinstall with 10.4.7

Since I have it all bound to AD and it was a pain to setup do I need to clean install from scratch or can I install over and will my settings stay?

You can do an archive and install with 10.4. Then, apply the 10.4.7 combo update and you are all set.

Anyway, i dont know about those bugs with 10.4.8...

Yeah if this is a work server, don't take my opinion. Play it safe and call Apple, it will be well worth the time over reinstalling.