Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

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

Best reply

donv_the_ghost

Level 9

50,930 points

Posted on Sep 3, 2009 6:00 PM

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.

View in context

64 replies

Sep 5, 2009 10:57 AM in response to Nethfel

Also have the same problem as the OP, so I'll bump this thread in the hope someone can find a solution. Used the upgrade option to upgrade from Leopard to Snow Leopard. Everything worked fine in Leopard, with Windows shares showing up in the finder sidebar. Personally I think it has something to with the master browser, but it's just a hunch.

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 5, 2009 9:06 PM in response to Paul Woodford

Ok, here's what I've done and what I've found:

1) I now have 2 hard drives setup for my Mac Pro:

First is my main, 1TB HD that had Leopard 10.5.8 and was subsequently upgraded to SL
Second is a spare I had floating around, a 80 Gig that I did a wipe and clean install of SL on.

2) Both versions I tweaked my smb.conf file located in /etc. I did this because it did not seem to me that the WINS configuration tab was listing the workgroup, nor taking what I typed in.

3) On initial configuration (with the settings I did on part 2) and starting of sharing, all I could see was my other Mac on my local network. (my laptop is at work, and my server Mac is sitting on a separate network). So, the vista machine, and my droboshare was not visible by finder. I set my smb.conf in both directions, so I forced the mac to be the master browser (per Sambas config specifications) and I forced it to not be the master browser.

4) Using nmblookup I could:
* look up any computer by netbios name and it would return the IP.
* Do a query on the workgroup name and it return the listing, by IP, of each system in the workgroup (less the one I'm querying from, which I assume is normal as I saw the same behavior on the pro and the mini)

5) Using smbclient I was able to retrieve from each machine (at both mac pro and mac mini) - the machines were reporting the correct master browser and they were seeing various information - my wifes machine, the vista computer, when issued the smbclient -L referring to her machine, it shows all of the machines on the network (which to me would be normal since it is considered the master browser.

I didn't seem to be able to force my computer into the master browser roll, and it refuses to show other systems in the workgroup through the finder - all I can see is my HTMac.

All systems have DNS entries, and can be resolved via both forward and reverse DNS, and the netbios computer names are the same as the DNS computer names.

RodneyW

Level 4

3,035 points

Sep 5, 2009 11:47 PM in response to Nethfel

Nice work. I have also done the digging at the Samba level - and from an "nmblookup/smbclient" perspective have found no problems at all, when using the default configuration. I am not a fan of forcing the Mac to win the Master Browser elections - I want it to be able to slot into the existing network (rather than taking control!).

It just doesn't work properly through the Finder in 10.5/10.6 (my 10.4.11 Powerbook has no problems in this regard).

Thus there could be a problem within the newer "smbd" or Finder.

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 6, 2009 7:36 AM in response to RodneyW

Yeah, I agree - having to force one way or another *****.

I'm forcing it to loose elections atm, and I can confirm that my wifes vista box does win the election (smbclient -L with my system name shows my wifes computer as the master for the workgroup) so it is acknowledging that my wifes is the master.

I've also forced it to win elections on the workgroup

But, it doesn't seem to matter whether it is master or not, finder just won't display other systems in the workgroup, which is weird since doing nmblookup on the workgroup does list the systems (so samba can find the workgroup computers) and a list of master browsers shows my wifes ip, see outputs here:

sh-3.2# nmblookup -L MSHOME
querying MSHOME on 10.1.1.255
10.1.1.199 MSHOME<00>
10.1.1.28 MSHOME<00>
10.1.1.60 MSHOME<00>
sh-3.2# nmblookup -M -- -
querying _MSBROWSE_ on 10.1.1.255
10.1.1.28 _MSBROWSE_<01>
sh-3.2#

my system is 10.1.1.13, but it seems that samba won't list the computer that is running the query as a system in the workgroup - almost like it's listing every other computer - and I wonder if somehow that is part of the problem, or is that normal? For example, if I'm on my home theater mac (mac mini, 10.6, ip .60) and run the same command I get:

htmac:~nethfel$ nmblookup -L MSHOME
querying MSHOME on 10.1.1.255
10.1.1.199 MSHOME<00>
10.1.1.13 MSHOME<00>
10.1.1.28 MSHOME<00>
htmac:~nethfel$ nmblookup -M -- -
querying _MSBROWSE_ on 10.1.1.255
10.1.1.28 _MSBROWSE_<01>
htmac:~nethfel$

as you can see, 10.1.1.60 is missing from the list - but I don't know if it should be in the list, or if the list is supposed to represent every OTHER computer that is part of the domain on the network... If it is supposed to be part of the list, then that may be part of the issue - in terms of it's announcing it's part of the workgroup, but it isn't recognizing itself as part of the workgroup...?

Sep 6, 2009 7:43 AM in response to Nethfel

I was only guessing it could be a master browser problem because if I do "nmblookup -M -- -" it doesn't return a master browser (I've set my mac to be master browser in smb.conf), whereas it did in Leopard. I've used smbclient -L and that reports that my Mac is the master browser, so I don't know why there should be a discrepancy between the two commands.

Although, it could be just a symptom of an underlying problem in the new finder, as RodneyW pointed out. The only reason I set my Mac as the master browser, is that was the only way I could get Windows shares to show up in finder.

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 6, 2009 8:26 AM in response to Paul Woodford

Were you able to get the shares to appear? They never did for me when I had it set to master browser unless I just didn't set the computer level high enough..

Sep 6, 2009 10:20 AM in response to Nethfel

What I did was set "domain master = yes" and "preferred master = yes" in smb.conf, leaving "os level" at 2. Then I disabled the computer browser service on my windows machines and, after switching them on, they would show up in my Finder sidebar after a few minutes.

However, even after copying my old Leopard smb.conf across to Snow Leopard, I can't get my Windows machines to show up in Finder any-more (as others have noted). Unless I use Go -> Connect from the Finder menu.

Sep 6, 2009 11:10 AM in response to Paul Woodford

I'm guessing this is a fairly widespread problem that is occurring with Snow Leopard? Anyone not having the same troubles?

For those of us who don't quiet understand the inner workings of the OS, I would presume Apple will have spotted a problem like this and will rectify the problem in 10.6.1? Do Apple keep a check on these forums for such problems?

Sep 6, 2009 11:13 AM in response to Paul Woodford

Snow Leopard ate my network too. It is one hungry animal. My file and print sharing is gone. Even when I Go, Connect to server...it error's out. I can ping the XP machine that has the files and printer but I can not talk to it.

I am not wanting to become an energy engineer with a minor in software repair. I have real work to get back to. That is why I went Mac. It just works.

Well...now it just doesn't work and I wonder if there is a work around till Apple acknowledges they have a problem and then gets an upgrade to fix.

Sep 6, 2009 11:16 AM in response to OysterOyster

My thoughts exactly. See my other post. I have been caught off guard with this one. The little bit of speed up on start up is not worth the time I am spending trying to get my network back.

I called Apple support and they acted like I was from Mars. They said they never heard of this problem.

Sep 6, 2009 11:42 AM in response to JeffMacBook12

Hehe, sorry about going off on one. I agree, Macs should just work. I'm just wondering if there's one common cause for all the problems described on this thread? If so, it sounds like it would be straightforward for Apple to put out a fix for this problem (or maybe for some user to find a cure).

Hopefully, the fact this problem has come up a few times in these forums, shows that a fair percentage of up-graders are suffering from it too, and that it might be known to Apple (I know they don't read these forums).

Sep 6, 2009 11:49 AM in response to Paul Woodford

I've just read a couple of news articles which talk of 10.6.1 being seeded to developers already for test, something many believe will be imminently released to the public, especially with the vulnerabilities caused by the out of date flash player distributed within Snow Leopard.

However, having read about some of the main fixes that are supposed to be included in this update, there is no mention of this particular problem.

See http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=5327 for the list. Hopefully it's included in the upgrade somewhere...

Nethfel Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 6, 2009 1:21 PM in response to OysterOyster

I wouldn't be surprised if 6.1 is being seeded - looking at the past upgrade history for OSX for 4 and 5, the .1 was released 1 month after the the main os was released.

Sep 6, 2009 4:05 PM in response to Paul Woodford

Actually you bring up a very good point. Does Apple get the feedback they need to properly prioritize bug fixes? I was told I was the only one who has notified Apple support about this Lan network problem. But let's say there is a technical problem with 10.6 connecting to Windows networks. Hmmm. If say only 20% of the PC world is Apple and 80% is Windows, does it not stand to reason that most Apples will be connecting to a Windows network to get the job done? That's how I see it from my single customer's perspective anyway.

So I find it hard to believe that Apple made a major release of an op sys that although may speed up the processes of the Mac just a bit, removes it from the network where the whole job gets done. And then if their measure of customer support is to wait till the questions eek out of these techie forums...that's not the Apple I expected.

How do we contact Apple directly to get input to them for a fix? I have a case # for my call but that was hard enough for even me to get to happen. I can't imagine the less technical person getting through to them.

BobHarris

Level 9

53,849 points

Sep 6, 2009 5:42 PM in response to JeffMacBook12

I would encourage you to file a bug with Apple at either:
<http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html>
or
<http://bugreporter.apple.com>
Free ADC (Apple Developer Connection) account needed for BugReporter

Snow Leopard not showing computers on network