Network computer access

  • Thread starter Thread starter Tim Kowal
  • Start date Start date
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Tim Kowal

I have a user at my organization who, every once in a while, will not have
the entire list of computers come up in My Network Places (Windows 2000
pro). He cannot even get to the missing computers by UNC name. After a
reboot, it is often fixed. What could be causing this?
 
Hello,

Do you have a WINS server defined for this user? If not they he is relying
on LMHOSTS or more likely broadcasts to resolve the netbios names. My
Network Places relies on browsing. Because the browser service relies on
server broadcasts, its communication is connectionless and by definition
unreliable. A server's browser role is defined dynamically with periodic
elections, determining the flow of communication used to provide the browse
list to a specific client computer can be difficult.

Do you have a flat network or a number of different subnets? A flat
network is best for browsing. There is a utility named Browstat.exe that
comes from the Microsoft Windows Resource Kit. You can use this utility to
determine who the master browser for your domain and subnet are. Once this
is determined you can see if you can connect to this computer.

Run a "browstat status" to see if browsing is active and who the master
browser is. You can also see if there are any backup browsers. These
troubleshooting steps are included in the following article;

188305 Troubleshooting the Microsoft Computer Browser Service
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=188305

Larry Stotler, MCSE
Microsoft Product Support

NOTE: Please reply to the newsgroup and not directly to me. This allows
others to add to and benefit from these threads and also helps to ensure a
more timely response. Thank you!

This posting is provided "AS IS" without warranty either expressed or
implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of
merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose
 
I thought that Windows 2000 networking did away with WINS, and relied
instead on DNS for the functions WINS used to provide. Is this incorrect?
 
Hello,

You are correct in that we no longer use Netbios name resolution for logon
or Active Directory purposes. However, you are fighting a browsing issue
and browsing still uses netbios names. You can do this in small networks
without WINS, however, in my experience WINS assists greatly in getting
complete browse lists.

Here is an excerpt from the article I referenced in my last post;

Remember that name resolution among all browsers is critical and that the
first thing to do is to establish a robust name resolution infrastructure
with WINS. A lot of time can be wasted trying to track down browser
issues, which are really caused by name resolution problems.

188305 Troubleshooting the Microsoft Computer Browser Service
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=188305

Larry Stotler, MCSE
Microsoft Product Support

NOTE: Please reply to the newsgroup and not directly to me. This allows
others to add to and benefit from these threads and also helps to ensure a
more timely response. Thank you!

This posting is provided "AS IS" without warranty either expressed or
implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of
merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose
 
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