WINS replication

Mike400 · 2016-11-03T12:01:46.000Z

Bottman:

Bryce beat me to it.

WINS is Microsoft’s own version of DNS and most people don’t use it; you are far better off using DNS than WINS.

Not exactly. WINS and DNS worked together to allow NetBEUI (NetBIOS over TCP) to route. NetBIOS is an unroutable protocol and many NT 4 and earlier era services and systems needed NetBEUI to communicate.

prkelly · 2016-11-03T12:22:43.000Z

OK guys, I’m not here to deal with this. I asked a simple question and am looking for an answer. We have legacy systems, lets just leave it at that.

big-green-man · 2016-11-03T12:27:44.000Z

You’ll see any of the below events in Event Viewer if replication fails:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/316835

I believe you have to enable logging in WINS first.

prkelly · 2016-11-03T12:28:44.000Z

Right now all three servers show Responding under their status, that tells me that they are replicating. Am I correct?

Just checked active registrations and am seeing my entire network. I think I’m good to go.

brianinca · 2016-11-03T12:28:48.000Z

IF you have push/pull setup properly, go look at the WINS entries on the new server. If it’s populated, you’re good, if not, which seems unlikely, please come back and fill in the details.

Why people get grouchy about WINS, I dunno - MFP’s that use SMB1 are hardly uncommon, for instance.

prkelly · 2016-11-03T12:32:24.000Z

Thanks Brianica, can you confirm my above post?

big-green-man · 2016-11-03T12:34:18.000Z

Brianinca:

Why people get grouchy about WINS, I dunno - MFP’s that use SMB1 are hardly uncommon, for instance.

And those of use who are stuck with supporting old manufacturing equipment.

WINS is never going away here.

brianinca · 2016-11-03T12:40:53.000Z

PRKELLY:

Right now all three servers show Responding under their status, that tells me that they are replicating. Am I correct?

Just checked active registrations and am seeing my entire network. I think I’m good to go.

Yeah, that’s what you want to see - ownership/registration will be limited based on what your DHCP scope(s) tell the clients, so don’t forget to update that. Doesn’t do much good to have redundancy if the clients don’t know about it!

brianinca · 2016-11-03T12:42:30.000Z

Big Green Man:

Brianinca:

Why people get grouchy about WINS, I dunno - MFP’s that use SMB1 are hardly uncommon, for instance.

And those of use who are stuck with supporting old manufacturing equipment.

WINS is never going away here.

Heck, how about NEW manufacturing equipment?!?!? “Hey, let’s buy a waterjet with a no-name PC controller with Chinese WinRAR shareware installed on it, yeah!”

brycekatz · 2016-11-03T12:59:44.000Z

PRKELLY:

OK guys, I’m not here to deal with this. I asked a simple question and am looking for an answer. We have legacy systems, lets just leave it at that.

Which is fine. Understand that including that bit of info in your first post would have avoided the “WINS?! Gah!” conversation entirely, c.f., Asking Better Questions .

Mike400 · 2016-11-03T13:11:36.000Z

Do you have other WINS servers on the same subnet? If so you don’t really need to add another WINS server. One per subnet is sufficient. When I was using WINS I always put it on the same server as DNS to reduce network traffic between WINS and DNS.

My point is that while you may need WINS, you should really keep the number of WINS servers to an absolute minimum since WINS replication has always been somewhat touchy.

prkelly · 2016-11-03T13:14:23.000Z

Bryce, I completely disagree with you. People don’t post on SW asking a question with the expectation of smarta** comments, we come expecting professional and helpful information. Again, it was a simple question which needed a simple answer.

I’m not here to argue what is and is not a “good” question in your opinion. If you don’t have anything constructive to add to a thread, maybe think about skipping that REPLY button…

brycekatz · 2016-11-03T13:14:33.000Z

Brianinca:

Big Green Man:

Brianinca:

Why people get grouchy about WINS, I dunno - MFP’s that use SMB1 are hardly uncommon, for instance.

And those of use who are stuck with supporting old manufacturing equipment.

WINS is never going away here.

Heck, how about NEW manufacturing equipment?!?!? “Hey, let’s buy a waterjet with a no-name PC controller with Chinese WinRAR shareware installed on it, yeah!”

About 2.5 years ago, a client of mine dropped somewhere around $500k on a brand new CNC laser. The purchase included a brand-new Dell laptop with an i7 processor … loaded with Windows XP. When I called the vendor to pitch a fit, they told me it was because the Italian company who wrote the controller software didn’t have a 64-bit driver for the robotics my client didn’t purchase.

prkelly · 2016-11-03T13:17:39.000Z

I am replacing the existing WINS server. It was a 2003 STD server and I have finally convinced the VP to go with new servers. I have a new Hyper-V host running a VM DC and a new physical DC as well. Blood from a rock over here.

We still have legacy machines on the network and no guess when they will be retired is a good guess.

big-green-man · 2016-11-03T13:23:41.000Z

Bryce Katz:

Brianinca:

Big Green Man:

Brianinca:

Why people get grouchy about WINS, I dunno - MFP’s that use SMB1 are hardly uncommon, for instance.

And those of use who are stuck with supporting old manufacturing equipment.

WINS is never going away here.

Heck, how about NEW manufacturing equipment?!?!? “Hey, let’s buy a waterjet with a no-name PC controller with Chinese WinRAR shareware installed on it, yeah!”

About 2.5 years ago, a client of mine dropped somewhere around $500k on a brand new CNC laser. The purchase included a brand-new Dell laptop with an i7 processor … loaded with Windows XP. When I called the vendor to pitch a fit, they told me it was because the Italian company who wrote the controller software didn’t have a 64-bit driver for the robotics my client didn’t purchase.

Sounds like the same Italian company that manufactures the automated inspection machines our QC department likes to purchase without IT input.

Mike400 · 2016-11-03T13:39:50.000Z

PRKELLY:

I am replacing the existing WINS server. It was a 2003 STD server and I have finally convinced the VP to go with new servers. I have a new Hyper-V host running a VM DC and a new physical DC as well. Blood from a rock over here.

We still have legacy machines on the network and no guess when they will be retired is a good guess.

By legacy, do you mean hardware and software released prior to Windows XP & Server 2003? If not you may be able to do away with WINS. It’s worth a check (turn the WINS service off and see what happens).

prkelly · 2016-11-03T13:48:13.000Z

Yes prior to server 2003.

brycekatz · 2016-11-03T13:49:07.000Z

PRKELLY:

Bryce, I completely disagree with you. People don’t post on SW asking a question with the expectation of smarta** comments, we come expecting professional and helpful information. Again, it was a simple question which needed a simple answer.

I’m not here to argue what is and is not a “good” question in your opinion. If you don’t have anything constructive to add to a thread, maybe think about skipping that REPLY button…

Perhaps I should have donned my moderator cap in that post. So, speaking as a moderator:

The IT pros in the Spiceworks community are a great resource, but we also come from a wide variety of backgrounds and tend, as a group, to think in very specific ways. History has proven that including as much relevant information as possible in your initial post (such as “we need to use X because $LigitReasons” or “We’ve already tried $ListOfSolutions”) will do a lot for keeping the discussion focused on your question and will minimize the likelihood of bunny-trail conversations over whether you should even use/consider X. The link provided is a community-accepted “best practice post”, and is one of the highest-spiced posts in the community, ever. I think it’s safe to say the suggestions contained therein are not just my opinion.

More, history also shows that an apparently “simple question” frequently isn’t, and “simple answers” often aren’t. The IT pros in the community tend to address root cause of an issue, and will ask for more information if they feel your “simple question” is lacking necessary information.

/me doffs moderator cap

Finally, I can assure you I wasn’t trying to be a smartass and it was not my intention to offend. I was asking what I felt was a perfectly legitimate follow-up question. You might be surprised by how many times a similar question was answered with, “It was like that when I got here,” or, “Y’know, you’re right - we have no good reason to use $DepricatedTech. I’ll decommission. Thanks!” You might also be surprised by the number of times a pointed question revealed the poster was going down the completely wrong path, which was only discovered 3 pages in when everyone stopped taking the OP at face value.

brycekatz · 2016-11-03T13:53:49.000Z

Moving back to topic:

It’s been well over a decade since I’ve had to deal with WINS, and I’ve forgotten much of what I knew. Here are a few articles on the subject of WINS troubleshooting you may find useful:

google.com

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prkelly · 2016-11-04T13:43:28.000Z

Thanks for the response Bryce, I can think of a few times posting very detailed questions on the boards of late that have brought out the smarta** responses and as I was in a bind yesterday my patience was at it’s limit.

I was able to confirm replication by checking active registrations.