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View Full Version : Workgroup browsing too damn slow in WinXP Pro!!!

The Punisher
05-06-04, 09:44 AM
Are there any special settings in WinXP Pro SP1 that can speed up its network browsing? Whenever I browse my workgroup I've to wait about 30 seconds just for the list of PCs to a appear. Then when it does, I've to wait another 20 seconds or so when I click on one of the PCs to show its shared folders! I never had to wait this long to browse my workgroup with Win98SE so I was wondering if there was any special network settings or registry entries or services etc that need to be adjusted to make browsing faster. The PCs typically running in my workgroup are P4s with MSI mobos with at least 256MB RAM. All PCs are using D-Link network cards with proper D-Link drivers installed instead of the default Realtek driver that WinXP uses. Any help is appreciated.
sytaylor
05-06-04, 10:43 AM
I have the same problems sometimes on the LAN here at work. The easiest way around it is to create a mapped drive to the network machine you access. For some reason it seems to run faster that way.
Phyre
05-10-04, 02:06 AM
I'm not sure if this will work, but check the services on every machine. You'll want to locate the computer browser service. Disable this service on all machines except one. This service basically keeps a list of all computers in the workgroup. Each machine that this service is running on will "fight" for the role of being the computer browser. If that doesn't work, you'll probably have to look elsewhere. However, it is a good practice to have this service running on only one machine.

Phyre
The Punisher
05-11-04, 04:46 AM
I'm not sure if this will work, but check the services on every machine. You'll want to locate the computer browser service. Disable this service on all machines except one. This service basically keeps a list of all computers in the workgroup. Each machine that this service is running on will "fight" for the role of being the computer browser. If that doesn't work, you'll probably have to look elsewhere. However, it is a good practice to have this service running on only one machine.

Phyre

Never heard anything like this but I'm running out of options so I'll give it a go. As far as I've read, the Computer Browser service in WinXP should be essential to allow a PC to browse other PCs in the workgroup & shouldn't be stopped.