Can't we just all get along?

[Aarmenaa]

I've had a home network for a year and a half now, and I've had plenty of problems. But, I've never seen one quite like this:

I have 2 Win98 SE computers, 1 ME computer, and 2 XP computers on the network. The ME computer and one of the XP computers are having problems keeping an updated list of network resources.

This means that if I turn off a computer, it should disappear from the network, and it does on some of the computers. But, for the computers in question, they never realize that the computer left the network!

These 2 computers also have great difficulty exchanging files over the network. Sometimes they cannont connect to anything until I restart them. What's causing this? The problem is the same, but it's 2 differnet OSes. Could my hub be on it's way out? I've tried everything to fix this. Any suggestion would be helpful!

-Aarmenaa:t

[smily_03]

this problem happens because windows will 'cache' the names and ip addresses of the computers so that the next time you try to access those computers it won't have to map the computer name to its ip address, then do an arp request to map the computer mac address to the computer's IP address. these lists are refreshed every so often, so the turned-off comps should disappear when this happens. In the meantime, Windows keeps the other computers in its list.

as for your comp's not being able to transfer files, how is the network set up? does it have static ip's or a dhcp server on a router or a shared internet connection? also, what is the speed and duplex of your nic's and hub? a true hub will not allow full duplex, it has to be half-duplex. finally, how far apart are the computers from one another? there can be a maximum of 100m of cable in between the nic and the hub. is there anything around the networking cable that could cause interference? such as unshielded fluorescent lighting, large motors (in furnaces, a/c units, etc)?

[Aarmenaa]

I am using a Linksys 10 MB true hub (only operates in half-duplex). My NICs are 10/100 autosensing. The network assigns IP adresses using DHCP. There is less than 100m of cable between the NIC and the hub, and I took care to make sure there was no interference.

I believe that the problems are related, however because only the computers that do not update thier list of computers have trouble transferreing files. This problem also only occours on ME and XP computers in my home, leading me to believe that it is probably the same culprit in both systems.

-Aarmenaa

[smily_03]

you might try setting the nic's on the two trouble machines to 10Mbps half duplex instead of autosense. i've seen cases where even though it picks the right thing, it won't perform as good as when you tell it what to pick. this happened on one of the servers we have at work. even though it automatically picked 100Mbps full duplex, it performed poorly until we set it to that manually.

[Aarmenaa]

Well, I never though about that, but I suppose it could make a difference-espicially considering that all my NICs are the cheap no-name brand. I'll give it a try-thanks!

-Aarmenaa