Peer-to-Peer without NetBeui

[Mark Everly]

Am quite sure this has been discussed 1000's of times.
My apologies for asking again. However, I could not find
a definitive answer.

We have a small network (<10) computers running a mix of
2000 and XP. We have 1 "server". However, it is simply
another Peer on the network. Currently, to access shared
resources between PC's we use NetBeui (Added to XP
machines). However, we have an application to access
external resources (CheckPoint) that will not function
with NetBeui as it considers it insecure.

I see references to using TCP as a method of "internal"
networking, but could not find answers on how to
configure.

Is there a "how-to" that might provide some info.

Many thanks in advance for any advice

Mark Everly

 

[Chris Knapp]

You don't need NetBEUI if you have TCP/IP installed already. As long as each
PC has a unique IP address & NetBIOS name, you can use peer-to-peer
connections. The 2 issues most have with peer-to-peer networks is finding
the peers (name resolution) and accessing shares once the peer is found.
With less than 10 PC's on the lan, name resolution shouldn't be a problem
(they will broadcast themselves to each other.) Accessing the shares will be
exactly as if you had NetBEUI installed: The connecting peer must know a
valid username & password on the shared peer.

example.

PC1:
NetBIOS Name = COMP1
IP = 192.168.1.100
User logs in locally as "bob" , password "123"

PC2:
NetBIOS Name = COMP2
IP = 192.168.1.101
User logs in locally as "Joe", password "456"

For Bob to connect to Joe's computer, he would either have to:
1) know Joe's login & password, -or-
2) Joe would have to create a user account on COMP2 named "bob" with the
password "123". -or-
3) There is a third way but I hesitate to tell you since it will open your
PC up to anyone. hint: search the help for "Guest Account."

Good luck

 

[Guest]

Chris,

Thanks for the info. At the risk of sounding completely
ignorant (Which as far as networking I'm pretty close),
how does one configure the NetBIOS name. Is this simply
the computers name that is set up as part of the
workgroup configuration? I will continue to search for
the answer on my end

Thanks again for all the help,
Mark

Thanks again for all the help

 

[Chris Knapp]

You are correct. Computer name = netbios name.

Chris,

Thanks for the info. At the risk of sounding completely
ignorant (Which as far as networking I'm pretty close),
how does one configure the NetBIOS name. Is this simply
the computers name that is set up as part of the
workgroup configuration? I will continue to search for
the answer on my end

Thanks again for all the help,
Mark

Thanks again for all the help