Random reboots after bridging two ethernet connections

I'm connecting to two identical Huawei routers via two ethernet adapters (the onboard Broadcom NIC & a recently installed Realtek RTL8169 PCI). As a matter of curiosity, I've created a network bridge between the two ethernet connections. I want to check if there is any real benefit when the bridge is theoretically balancing the network load between the two connections. However, after creating the network bridge, Windows 11 (build 22635.3350) started randomly rebooting a few times per day. Actually, I don't need the damn bridge, but I'm really curious to know why it's causing Windows to crash!!!

Only thing comes to mind, check the Wake on LAN settings in the BIOS and in Windows, could be causing an issue.

I disabled the "Wake-Up LAN" and the "Power Saving" features in the BIOS and the settings of both adapters and the crashes didn't happen again!!! Anyway, I could see that the average network speed is practically the same with or without the bridge!!!

What is being reported at the time of the crash within Windows Event Viewer?

avintiski said:

What is being reported at the time of the crash within Windows Event Viewer?

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I took a look and the only entry in the event viewer that matches the last crash time says: "The Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor Driver Miniport had the event Network Interface deleted while PNP Device still exists."

VladdyProsa said:

I've created a network bridge between the two ethernet connections

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Could you clarify a few details for me, please? Are the two routers configured with completely different network subnets? I just want to be sure that you properly understand the purpose of a network bridge. The intention of a bridge is NOT to increase performance by joining or "teaming" two network adapters together. A bridge is intended to join two different networks together.

As an example, suppose that you have an internal network of 10.0.0.0 with subnet mask 255.0.0.0 and another network of 192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0. Since these are two completely different networks, they would not be able to talk to each other without some sort of routing. The bridge will allow you to join those networks.

On the other hand, if what you want to accomplish is increasing performance or setting up redundancy by using two network adapters on the same network, let me know and I can help you with that.

hsehestedt said:

Are the two routers configured with completely different network subnets?

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Sorry for the late reply, but I was at the ranch and the internet there sucks!!! My modem serves my office and home, but each network has its router!!! The PC I'm referring to is connected via cable to both routers!!! What led me to do this little experiment was pure curiosity, because I don't need the bridge!!! Anyway, as I mentioned before after disabling the wake-up LAN function in the BIOS and the power-saving mode for both adapters, whatever was causing the system to crash hasn't happened anymore!!!