Remove Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor Driver

I was figuring out the process for how to reconfigure our networking for our Hyper-V hosts. The configuration we had in place was a VM network adapter was connected to a vSwitch and used for host management. This vAdapter had an IP for the host OS.We went to using just the physical NIC, removing the vNIC and vSwitch and IP’ing the pNIC.The proper way to reconfigure the host was to remove the VM Network adapter with the commandGet-VMNetworkAdapter -ManagementOS Remove-VMNetworkAdapterThen remove the vSwitch Get-vmswitch -name 'Prod-Management-HostsLogical-Switch remove-vmswitchWhile I was figuring this out in the Test environment I removed the vSwitch without removing the vNIC first. There is now a “NIC” that is listed as a physical NIC with a name of Microsoft NetworkAdapter Multiplexor Driver and it is bound to another pNIC.I would like to remove this 'adapter'. I tried powershell and devcon with no luck. I asked our MS rep and he answered with using the PoSh LBFO commands and using devcon.Any other ideas on how to remove this adapter? Hi Elton,Thank you for your response.The first remark'When we want to remove external Vswitch and 'Host management VNic' we just need to remove that Vswitch.'

I have found to not be true.

If you have ever been in my shoes, you should know turning them back all on will never be possible. All I got was that my selection will cause Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor Protocol to be disabled.To save you this trouble in the future, I will just say turn every other thing on and live the multiplexor protocol. Your connection will work just fine. What is the Microsoft network adapter multiplexor protocolIt is basically a kernel-mode driver used for Network Interface Card (NIC) bonding. By default, the protocol is installed as part of the physical network adapter initialization.The one essence of this protocol is for. NIC Teaming often referred to as Load Balancing/Failover (LBFO), allows you to install additional physical Ethernet network adapters (NICs) into your server and “team” or combine them together to make one virtual NIC that provides and fault tolerance.I will recommend you to watch the Below mentioned YouTube Video on NIC Teaming. Uses of the Microsoft network adapter multiplexor protocolThe one time the Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor protocol is checked is in the teamed network adapter while it remains unchecked in the physical network adapters that are part of the NIC Teaming.For example, if there are two physical network adapters in a team, the Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor protocol will be disabled for these two physical network adapters and checked in the teamed adapter.This driver is used for two scenarios in teaming.

Microsoft Multiplexor Driver

Both of these scenarios require at least two connected network adapters on a single PC.Scenario 1 (Adapter teaming): This is using two or more adapters at the same time. Doing this allows one to send and receive more packets than a single adapter could.Scenario 2 (Adapter failover/high availability): This simply means there is a standby adapter that takes over the network connection if the primary fails.If you only have one adapter on your PC hooked up as is the likely case with your client OS enabling this protocol will result in Windows disabling it automatically as soon as it figures out you can’t team multiple adapters to work together on your PC. ConclusionThis capability was introduced with Windows Server 2012 and remains more a server-side protocol than client-based. It may not be needed even in windows 10.