VERY SLOW viewing comps in workgroup, network

[Punkrulz]

Hey guys,

Hoping you can help me with this one. I was just at a LAN party. There were a LOT of people on it, and as you can imagine you would figure the network would run pretty slow... it actually wasn't. Anyways, I ran into a few different issues with workgroups, and I need your help.

First off, Whenever I would go through My Network Places -> View Workgroup Computers, it would take about 5-15 minutes sometimes accessing a workgroup that only had 4 computers on it. I tried to narrow down whether the problem was networking related, or if it was just me... After using a few other computers, each of which had a considerable shorter load time, I have established that there is something on my computer that is making it this slow. However it isn't like that my network utilization is going through the roof, it's barely being used at all, so I don't quite think it's the work of a virus.

Second off, Whenever I would go through Windows Explorer, and go throguh My Network Places => Entire Network => Microsoft Windows Network, that took almost the same amount of time [a bit shorter actually] to load all of the different work groups. When I would choose the workgroup I wanted to view, that would return to waiting 5-15 minutes... just to see again maybe 3 computers on that work group. When I got done, if I wanted to go back browsing throughout the groups, it would still take just as long to see them.

As forementioned above, I believe this is a solely computer related issue on my part. I can't seem to find the problem. I believed that it was a services related issue, but after restoring default services, I have determined that that is not the issue since default services did not rectify the issue. Is there anything else I can look for that would be causing this??? This will end up being a severe issue next time. :/

 

[vonschlieffen]

http://tweakxp.com/tweak1557.aspx
http://www.tutorial-world.com/showtutorial.cfm/tutid/0047044714/sec/Networking

The above tweaks helped boost my lan browsing significantly, though My Network Places is still rather sluggish. I usually just map the shares I use frequently, though that probably isn't much help at a LAN party.

 

[Admiral Michael]

Nice, dunno kno bout you but I will be applying those!

hehe

 

[Punkrulz]

Hmm... that first tweak though: the only thing that baffles me about that one is it states to apply it to the server... well, if you're at a LAN that you're not hosting, how are you supposed to be able to do that? hehe. The second tweak though looks awesome, I applied it, but it won't be for quite some time until I'm able to test it in sort of the same type of environment. Thanks though!

 

[vonschlieffen]

You could be right, and the first tweak has no effect. I applied both at once (not smart, I know) so I'm not sure which one had the greatest/only effect.

 

[Admiral Michael]

actually, theres a limit of 10 computers on a peer-to-peer. So that could be the reason, after 10 I believe it gets slower. This I got from my cisco course.

 

[silis]

The problem is that by default windows searches for network shares and shared printers. There are two ways to fix this. The tweaks OR just disable file and print sharing on EVERYONE. I would recommend canning it via a tweak. X-Setup Pro (freeware) has a lot of tweaks with it - AND its interface is great. Also, disable UPNP detection. It can slow things up a bit as well.

 

[vonschlieffen]

If you were to disable file and print sharing, wouldn't that also disable the file sharing we're attempting to speed up?

 

[Wolf1.8]

actually, theres a limit of 10 computers on a peer-to-peer. So that could be the reason, after 10 I believe it gets slower. This I got from my cisco course.

According to MS also...that is correct

 

[Punkrulz]

Ok, well none of these suggestions has so far helped, I have set up my sisters computer to be the same workgroup as my own, and have the typical default directories shared. We are both on Windows XP, and we're going through my Linksys BEFSR41 Router. It takes just as long to go through My Network Places -> View Workgroup Computers at home with one other computer on the workgroup, as it did viewing 255 other people on the same workgroup / various workgroups.

Still trying to find some fixes, can't find anything on Microsoft or Google groups... and I don't want to have to format, 200gb lost is not a good feeling, ya know? So any other help is appreciated, and thanks for trying guys. :-/

 

[kevin19]

This registry tweak solved my network problems, it was extremely slow while browsing the network computers. Don't know if it's been posted earlier, but the above links didn't work.


Open up the Windows Registry editor by selecting Start > Run (or simply hit Win-R) and type 'regedit' (without quotes).

Now, navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RemoteComputer\NameSpace\

Delete the following two values:
{D6277990-4C6A-11CF-8D87-00AA0060F5BF}
{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}

 

[LordOfLA]

Techromancy at it's best 😀

Useful post though 🙂

 

[XeoNoX]

sounds like its a DNS prolblem, did you try disabling netbios?? you can aslo adjust your TTL.