Snow Leopard not showing computers on network

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Level 1

7 points

Snow Leopard not showing computers on network

Hi all,

I'm not sure what's going on here.

I have 3 computers and 1 nas currently turned on in my network.

1 is vista
1 is my mac pro 10.6
1 is my mac mini 10.6 connected via wifi
Nas is Droboshare

I can ping all machines.
I can mount shares via cmd+k if I know the ip address and share
I can't see any of the systems in my shared are
if I do a Shift cmdk to open the network panel, I don't see any computers, nor do I see any kind of workgroup listing. I know that all of the computers are set for the same workgroup. All systems are also pointing to my DNS, which has forward and reverse entries for all the NAT'd systems

Now I have another mac, a laptop. At work, it's not sitting on a domain controller, but I can open the network view in finder and I can see all of the domains as well as any workgroups in the network. I bring it at home, and I was able to see both macs (although not the pc) in the shared listing on the left pane of the finder.

The Vista machine can see all devices on the network (the Macs as well as the droboshare)

Any tips/suggestions welcome.

Early '08 Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.6)

Posted on Sep 3, 2009 8:22 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

donv_the_ghost

Level 9

50,930 points

Sep 3, 2009 6:00 PM in response to Nethfel

I am afraid that with SL what you don't see is what you get. Computers show up under shared only sporadically under SL. You have to keep using "Go to .... Sorry to be the carrier of bad news.

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Answer 2

LCee

Level 1

69 points

Sep 3, 2009 7:08 PM in response to Nethfel

I'm having the same network problem. But strangely it works great at my business. The only difference from work to home is my router. I have 2 different routers made by Linksys at home and both act the same way like the router is filtering the netbios discovery signals. I can connect manually from the mac but nothing shows up in the finder share unless I connect to a shared drive that I have manually connected to. Once I disconnect the shared drive the shared computer no longer registers in the finder share. It makes me want to pull my hair out. At this point I feel like Linksys is not mac compatible with SL. My XINCOM at work works really well. I'm at the point to pick up an Airport Extreme Base Station at a store near by.

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Answer 3

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 3, 2009 8:24 PM in response to LCee

See for me, it works great at work - now at home and at work is very similar equipment - a zyxel unit acting as firewall/nat and a cisco border router. But, at home all I have are workgroups, where at work I have multiple domain forests and two workgroups, and I can browse all of the child domains of both forests, as well as both workgroups without issue. It's almost like SL refuses to browse on a workgroup only network.

The real funny thing is tho - if I launch Plex, and to add media to my video library, I tell it I want to find an SMB share, it can see the workgroup and all of the systems in the workgroup as well as their shares - so I know for sure samba is working and working correctly - the problem seems more tied with how finder does (or in this case doesn't) seem to be interacting with samba correctly.

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Answer 4

LCee

Level 1

69 points

Sep 3, 2009 8:38 PM in response to Nethfel

Cisco makes Linksys, is there a pattern here? I

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Answer 5

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 3, 2009 9:26 PM in response to LCee

True, but cisco is my border router on my live side connected to my T1.

The Zyxel unit is providing firewall and NAT between my private network (where these computers exist) and the public side where my cisco sits - so in my case, the cisco has nothing to do with it as netbios broadcasts don't go outside of the NAT, and the border of the NAT is the ZyWall (the ZyXel product)

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Answer 6

Sep 3, 2009 10:31 PM in response to Nethfel

I have the same issue. This was the same on Leopard and Snow Leopard. At work, when I connect to the network I quickly and consistently see all computers on the network (all Windows) At home, I can see the other Macs in the house, but none of the Windows machines. If I try to connect directly "Go To" I can normally connect, but even that is not certain at times. Argh.

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Answer 7

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 4, 2009 6:24 AM in response to switcher98223

The one thing that is weird, and I wonder if it's somehow related, but the smb.conf file that is auto-generated by file sharing - I notice that in the workgroup field under global - it ALWAYS says:

WORKGROUP

it doesn't matter what you enter in the networking settings advanced panel for WINS with regard to workgroup, and I notice that the dropdown, if you're in a workgroup only environment doesn't seem to list the available workgroups (although if you're in a domain environment, or mixed domain/workgroup environment, that dropdown is fully populated)

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Answer 8

Sep 4, 2009 7:02 AM in response to Nethfel

Yep, I'm having the same problem. I am connected to my home network via a wireless router. Aside from my Macbook Pro, there is also two computers running Windows Vista and one running XP. Running Leopard the PCs in the house would appear under Shared in my finder but after upgrading to Snow Leopard yesterday nothing appears at all. I can connect to the PCs via Finder / Go / Connect to Server, but I don't want to have to do this every time!

The Windows PCs can clearly see my Mac.

There has to be a fix for this, and, if there's not, surely Apple will be doing something to fix this!?

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Answer 9

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 4, 2009 7:19 AM in response to OysterOyster

I hope so - looking at the patch history for Apple, chances are we'll have a patch somewhere around the 1 month after release date of SL which may take care of the problem.

I'm going to try throwing another drive in my mac pro and doing a clean install of SL and see if it works any differently then the systems I "upgraded" from leopard.

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Answer 10

RodneyW

Level 4

3,035 points

Sep 4, 2009 7:29 AM in response to OysterOyster

The "network browser" for Leopard (and Snow Leopard) definitely has some hiccups on Windows networks - especially if they are peer-to-peer.

On my work network, the domain controller acts as a master browser even if I am not logged into an Active Directory account... ergo all computers are visible. At home, my Macs, and Windows 2000/XP machines are all visible... but Vista/Windows 7 machines are not.

However, the Macs can always see other Macs. Instantly!

Sorry - I don't have a solution for this behaviour that is easy, although it is always worth testing things with your OS X firewall disabled.

Cheers,

Rodney

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Answer 11

LCee

Level 1

69 points

Sep 4, 2009 7:30 AM in response to Nethfel

You are wasting your time to fix the problem with a clean install. But with a clean install I've gained a lot more disk space even with the same applications installed. A clean install is worth it if you have disk space gain in mind.

Message was edited by: LCee

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Answer 12

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 4, 2009 8:03 AM in response to LCee

Well, understand - I'm not going to wipe my existing install. I have spare sata hard drives floating around my house, it's nothing for me to yank my boot drive and put in another one to do testing with - also the benefit is if I muck something up, it won't hose my normal system.

If there is a way around the bug tinkering with a clean install, I don't necessarily think it's a waste of time...

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Answer 13

LCee

Level 1

69 points

Sep 4, 2009 8:10 AM in response to Nethfel

I really hope he does find a solution.

One thing that bothers me is the remote desktop update that I said OK to. I wonder if that is the culprit. I can't repair that file with disk utility. Says it's been modified and won't repair. I don't even use the darn thing and no telling what preferences it has changed in the networking that we can't see. I'm just grabbing at straws at the moment. It's really bothering me.

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Answer 14

Sep 4, 2009 8:18 AM in response to LCee

I also have the same Remote Desktop (Remote Management do you mean perhaps?) permission that won't repair in Disk Utility.

BUT I don't think it's a problem at all, it was also there for me in Leopard and according to this Apple support document - it's something that can be safely ignored.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1448

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Answer 15

LCee

Level 1

69 points

Sep 4, 2009 9:01 AM in response to OysterOyster

Yes, that was what I meant. I did 2 clean installs the first time I ignored the RM update. And if I remember correctly the first install didn't have an issue of networking nor permission problems until I updated RM. I thought at first the RM wasn't the issue so did another clean install and accidentally hit the update to RM and the problem remained. Whether there is a correlation with RM and networking I don't know, I'm just too tired to do another clean install. I'll just wait for 10.6.1. If that doesn't fix it I'll try again without the RM update.

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