Ethernet card amnesia

[ian]

I have 3 machines in a simple home network.

The scene:
Machine A runs Win XP Home.
Machine B runs Win98 SE.
Machine C also runs Win98 SE.

Each machine shares some folders for the other machines to read.

The network protocol is NETBeui.


What happens:
A and B can see each other's network shares. All working fine.

A and B can see C's shares, but C cannot see either A's or B's
shares.

On C, clicking on Network Neighborhood produces an indefinitely
waving
flashlight. No sign of the shares from A or B.


Now comes the magic:
On C, run WINIPCFG, release all DHCP leases and renew them.

Re-open Network Neighborhood, and the shares from A and B
immediately appear.

Close Network Neighborhood and immediately re-open it. The waving
flashlight appears again.

Run WINIPCFG again as above, and the shares re-appear.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The above scenario is 100% reproducible every time. C appears to be
forgetting its network card settings, and won't work until they are
refreshed.

Ideas anyone?

[daytripper]

Post by ian
I have 3 machines in a simple home network.
Machine A runs Win XP Home.
Machine B runs Win98 SE.
Machine C also runs Win98 SE.
Each machine shares some folders for the other machines to read.
The network protocol is NETBeui.
A and B can see each other's network shares. All working fine.
A and B can see C's shares, but C cannot see either A's or B's
shares.
On C, clicking on Network Neighborhood produces an indefinitely
waving
flashlight. No sign of the shares from A or B.
On C, run WINIPCFG, release all DHCP leases and renew them.
Re-open Network Neighborhood, and the shares from A and B
immediately appear.
Close Network Neighborhood and immediately re-open it. The waving
flashlight appears again.
Run WINIPCFG again as above, and the shares re-appear.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The above scenario is 100% reproducible every time. C appears to be
forgetting its network card settings, and won't work until they are
refreshed.
Ideas anyone?

I bet your Win98SE machine and your XP machine are playing Master Browser
Roulette. To prove it, disable the Master Browser service on the '98 systems,
let the XP system handle that task, and see if your browser problems vanish...

/daytripper

[ian]

Post by daytripper
I bet your Win98SE machine and your XP machine are playing Master Browser
Roulette. To prove it, disable the Master Browser service on the '98 systems,
let the XP system handle that task, and see if your browser problems vanish...

Thanks daytripper. I think you've knocked the nail on the head. This
page seems to cover the situation:

<http://www.chicagotech.net/browser.htm#Understanding Computer Browser
and Protocols>

I will follow up next week.

[ian]

Post by daytripper
I bet your Win98SE machine and your XP machine are playing Master Browser
Roulette. To prove it, disable the Master Browser service on the '98 systems,
let the XP system handle that task, and see if your browser problems vanish...

Hi Daytripper. You can award yourself a teampoint! In the end, I
disabled the master browser on the XP machine, and suddenly everything
sprang into life. Thanks again for your input.