Browsing computers in multiple subnets - not working

Apr 28, 2005 2 Replies
C

I am having an issue where I can not use the windows browser to find PC's on different subnets. We use all Cisco routers and switches -



2621's and 3550's. I can ping a computer across subnets by name or IP, I can get to them in windows if I type \\computername, but when I browse the network I only see the computers running on that particular subnet. This is not a huge problem except for things like deploying SAV from the console - it will only see the computers on the main subnet, so I can not manually push the client install out, or see the logs for that matter. We do not have a WINS server setup, only DNS - could this be the problem? One of the techs that was here suggested it might be something not enabled, or blocked rather, on the routers - does this sound plausible?

Thanks,



Chris.



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T

In order to browse across subnets, you MUST have WINS running and the clients and servers configured to use it. Clients use broadcast messages to resolve NetBIOS names to IP addresses on the local subnet. Broadcasts do not propagate across subnets, otherwise you would have IP broadcast storms. This is why NetBIOS names work on the local subnets, but not when trying query for names located on other subnets. WINS solves this by keeping track of all the NetBIOS names and IP's on all subnets. Clients and servers must be configure to use WINS in order for this to work. If the servers aren't configure, they won't update the WINS servers with their names and IP's, and if clients are configured, than they won't know to query the WINS server instead of sending broadcasts to the local subnet. Active Directory uses DNS exclusively to find names and does not require WINS.

Scott

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C

Much appreciated information - confims what I was thinking, but could only speculate to. Have a nice day!

Chris.

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