Saturday, January 29, 2011

Windows Server 2003 can't see Vista machine

Hi there, I've got a real PITA problem that I'm sure has a really simple solution. I have a Windows Server 2003 machine that needs to be able to see the network name of a Vista box - but refuses to. It can see the Vista box (and even access its shared folder) if I enter the Vista box's IP address.

Problem is: SQL Server refuses to do Replication with anything other than the "actual server name". That means that the 2003 machine needs to be able to connect through the Vista machines network name... not just its IP address.

I'm guessing it's a simple incompatibility between OS's, but I'm sure there's got to be a simple way of fixing it.

Note: Yes, the Vista machine can connect to 2003 machine, no problem. And other machines in the office can connect to both the Vista machine and 2003 (they have more recent OS's).

Thanks for any help!

  • Try turning the firewall off on the Vista machine, reboot it and see if it shows up. Second thing, check the Network type, set it to Private if it is set to public. Reboot and check if the Server "sees" it.

    Django Reinhardt : Thanks, all Firewalls are disabled (we're trying everything), and as I said, other machines can connect to the Vista machine no problem. Is it not likely to be an OS compatibility? :-/
    dimitri.p : if the server "sees" other Vista machine, check DNS settings of the one that is not showing up against one of the others. I'm going to guess :) that The server is all up to date as well as the Vista machine with Windows updates
    From dimitri.p
  • If other machines can connect to it than it's proabably more of a SQL issue. Did you run the User Provisioning Tool for Vista on the workstation after install SQL? If not, give that a shot. It's located at %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Shared\sqlprov.exe by default.

    Also, make sure the SQL Browser service is running on the Vista machine.

    Also, what version/edition of SQL is on the Vista machine?

    Django Reinhardt : It's not just a SQL thing because we have a shared folder setup on the Vista machine (x32 Ultimate, BTW), and it can't be accessed by the OS entering the network name (unlike with other machines). It's a real head scratcher :( Will give the SQLProv a shot, though. Thanks.
    From squillman
  • Looks like a DNS issue.

    Probably the vista machine's name can't be resolved via DNS, so NetBIOS is used... which, as everyone knows, may or may not work, depending on a lot of factors.

    Can you ping the Vista machine using its network name?

    Django Reinhardt : Aha! No, I cannot ping the Vista machine from the 2003 machine! (But I CAN do it from the other machines that can connect to the Vista machine.) How do I fix this? Do I need to install anything? Thanks so much!
    squillman : +1 Yeah, this is more likely the cause.
    Django Reinhardt : If I manually edited the HOSTS file, would that fix it? :)
    Django Reinhardt : Editing the HOSTS file *did* fix it... but I'm wondering if there's a better solution to do with fixing the DNS issue? Thanks!
    dimitri.p : Did you check the network settings against a machine the server "sees" ?
    squillman : @Django: Verify that there's an address record in DNS for the Vista box and that the 2008 box is using the right DNS server(s). Try removing the hosts entry then doing a `ipconfig /flushdns` on the 2008 box.
    dimitri.p : 2003 machine :)
    From Massimo

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