Hi Martin ORACLE_SID is passed as a command line argument to oracle.exe (see the executable path in properties of the service) Semaphore issues usually indicate an O/S resource issue. I'd look at the total demands you are making on memory and open files, is this 32bit? The diag dest behavior is normal by the way. On 27 Aug 2010 08:15, "Martin Klier" <usn@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: Good CEST morning. I try to run two instances out of one oracle_home on a Windows 2008R2 server (bad OS, but not my choice). Problems are, that all databases are using the DIAG directory (crates a new subdir with the correct SID anyway) configured by the instance that has been configured last. And the second instance fails with ugly semaphore errors. I think they try to use the same ressource for the same reason they use the same DIAG dir. Fri Aug 27 08:30:30 2010 RECO started with pid=15, OS id=4896 Fri Aug 27 08:30:30 2010 MMON started with pid=16, OS id=5104 starting up 1 dispatcher(s) for network address '(ADDRESS=(PARTIAL=YES)(PROTOCOL=TCP))'... starting up 1 shared server(s) ... ORACLE_BASE from environment = D:\app\oracle Fri Aug 27 08:30:30 2010 alter database mount exclusive ORA-09341: scumnt: Datenbank kann nicht mit MOUNT angeschlossen werden OSD-04400: Interne Semaphore für Prozess kann nicht abgerufen werden O/S-Error: (OS 183) Eine Datei kann nicht erstellt werden, wenn sie bereits vorhanden ist. ORA-1102 signalled during: alter database mount exclusive... My questions are: I have no ORACLE_SID configured on system level. How does the box determine the oracle_sid used for a process in services.msc? Second: After establishing the instances with DBCA, everything was well, the insatnces did run simultanously. After stopping/starting both services, the mess described above happened. Do I have a wrong setup somehow? I want to use one oracle_home, because I want to avoid different patch levels and messing around with setting/changing ORACLE_HOME all the time. Thanks in advance! Martin -- Usn's IT Blog for Linux, Oracle, Asterisk http://www.usn-it.de -- //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l