What does Windows error code 612 (ERROR_IP_ADDRESS_CONFLICT2) mean?

 
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ERROR_IP_ADDRESS_CONFLICT1 ERROR_REGISTRY_QUOTA_LIMIT

ERROR_IP_ADDRESS_CONFLICT2

What ERROR_IP_ADDRESS_CONFLICT2 means

This constant conveys the same practical condition as the first IP-conflict status: the local address is not unique on its broadcast domain. The separate values originate from internal notification paths, not from two fundamentally different remediation procedures.

Where it commonly appears

  • Duplicate-address detection during interface configuration
  • DHCP lease activation
  • Resume from sleep on a changed network
  • Virtual and physical adapters sharing copied configuration

Likely causes

  • A duplicate static assignment exists
  • DHCP state is inconsistent across servers
  • A sleeping host returned while its old address had been reassigned
  • A cloned system preserved network configuration
  • Layer-2 segmentation is not operating as expected

Troubleshooting checklist

  1. Capture both MAC addresses observed for the IP
  2. Check DHCP server logs around the lease time
  3. Inspect whether the event follows sleep, migration, or VM restore
  4. Validate switch port and VLAN membership
  5. Confirm that only one active interface is intended to own the address

Guidance for developers

Do not distinguish user-facing remediation solely by conflict1 versus conflict2. Normalize both to an address-conflict incident while preserving the original code in telemetry for low-level diagnosis.

Guidance for administrators

Assign a unique address and correct the source of duplicate allocation. Reserving addresses outside the dynamic pool and maintaining authoritative IP inventory prevents recurrence.

Example

A VM snapshot is restored on the same network while the original VM is still running. Both instances announce the same address; Windows raises this conflict variant. Changing the clone identity and network configuration is required.

Related conditions

This is not a DNS-name collision. DNS can be correct while the underlying IP address is duplicated, so name-server changes alone do not solve it.

References


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