Problems with browse lists

[Al Blake]

Excuse the x-post but I think you will see this applies to both areas:

About 6 months ago we reconfigured our Cisco 4006 core switch from a single
campus wide VLAN (500+ nodes) to multiple VLANs, one for each building.
(using a WS-X4014 supervisor module - layer III).

Since then our network has worked fine except for ONE thing - windows browse
lists.
The browse lists are always incomplete. ALL nodes on the LAN correctly
register and show up in the WINS database but the browse list does not show
all of them. The browse lists are also different (and incomplete) depending
where you are on the LAN. Now I suspect that this is something to do with
packets not correctly making it across the VLAN interfaces. (eg elections
are occuring on every VLAN when really we want every VLAN to use the IP of
the AD DC as its master browser).

We have an AD controller which acts as a PDC and WINS server @ 192.168.31.2
and have setup each VLAN with IP forwarding to this address. Here's an
example:

interface Vlan32
description IT centre building
ip address 192.168.32.1 255.255.254.0
ip helper-address 192.168.31.2
ip helper-address 192.168.32.31
ip pim sparse-mode
!

and we know the IP help-address is working because the nodes get into the
WINS database......so why is the browse list incomplete?
I know that windows browse lists are old fashioned with the arrival of AD -
but we have a number of legacy apps that make use of them (eg net send) and
these apps fail if they cant find a machine through the netbios browse list.

All our Nodes are Win2kor XP - we have no legacy machines. To my mind this
should mean that the AD controllers become the master and backup browse
masters for every VLAN segment, but this is obviously not happening. Why?

Anyone help with how to configure the Cisco and/or the workstations to
ensure they use a single consolidated browse master? (Preferrably the AD
DC).

Thanks
Al Blake, Australia

 

[Victor Sudakov]

and we know the IP help-address is working because the nodes get into the
WINS database...

Not necessarily so. Nodes register in the WINS database by means of
unicast, not broadcast (this is why the address of the WINS server
should be configured on the nodes). So your helper-address may be in
fact not working.

...so why is the browse list incomplete?
I know that windows browse lists are old fashioned with the arrival of AD -
but we have a number of legacy apps that make use of them (eg net send) and
these apps fail if they cant find a machine through the netbios browse list.

I believe "net send" does not use browse lists. It finds machines by
means of netbios name resolution.