Win XP file sharing limit?

The Clown Man

Im trying to set up a LAN in an office with 12 computers. I want a peer to peer network running a database which will record all the data on one computer from all the others. I am hesitant about setting up a server cause I think that it's more trouble than it's worth. if one goes down I want all the others to keep going because I am not able to service it regularly.

My question is: Will Win XP pro support file sharing on 12 computers on a peer to peer? What about Home?

I hear Win 2k only supports the traffic for 10 nodes without needing Win 2k server. Which is very expensive. Can Win XP support 12 without extra software?

Frank Grimes

I think this covers it:

http://www.wown.com/j_helmig/wxpservr.htm#limit

They're going to be using the .net OSes as the replacements for NT/2000 server afaik.

WhiteWashMan

never heard about the 10 node limit on win2k.
are you sure that isnt just a recommendation?

by the way, if you are collecting all the info from the pc's to one computer, then its acting as a server, so youre only fooling yourself

and youre not really allowing file sharing on 12 pc, you are only allowing file share on one pc, 12 times. the probl;em there is that you are going to have to map 11 drives to each computer.

if you set up one as a server, or as a central share, then you can run a script to map your drives for you.
in fact, then youd only have one drive to map to 11 other computers.much easier, much nicer and much simpilar by far.

peer to peer starts getting messy once you get to 10, so maybe thats where that figure came from.
you dont need 'server' software by the way, a simple workstation acting as a file server will do just as well and will save you a couple of grand on licensing, not to mention the cost of the physical server.

im not sure if this is what you need, but you can do what you are asking, but its easier to do as ive suggested, so take your pick and good luck

Frank Grimes

never heard about the 10 node limit on win2k.
are you sure that isnt just a recommendation?

afaik, that is the limit. It's there (from what I read), to stop people going out and buying 2K (and XP by the looks of things) Professional and using it as a server.

WhiteWashMan

what?
it stops more than 10 people connectiong at the same time?
do you have any documentation on that as id be interested to see it

Frank Grimes

It's only something I read, like I said it could be wrong. That link from wown that I posted already says something about it and quotes it's source. I didn't check out the source.

http://www.wown.com/j_helmig/wxpservr.htm#limit

Frank Grimes

Just found this:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q122920

and this one for XP

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q314882

The Clown Man

Cheers,

Thanks for the help.

I was going to set up the peer to peer to save myself the hassle of having to get a script to map the drives from one computer. The main reason for this is that if something does go wrong with the main 'server' then I won't be around to fix it and the network goes down altogether (It will be used for things like personal messages etc as well). However, I may just map the drives from it afterall. Can you recommend any decent proggys that will do this for me with minimum hassle?

I will probably just take the auto disconnect time down to 2 minutes on the computer the database is being stored and as there will only be 11 incoming connections max, there shouldn't be a problem in traffic as they won't be used all that extensively.

WhiteWashMan

thats mad interesting about the limits.
i never heard of them before.

i suppose its one way to discourage over use of per to peer networking, or using xp/2000 workstation as a server.
im not sure about win98 though, so you could use that, unless ive missed something, i dont think that has a limit does it?

Frank Grimes

Yeah, like I said above, the limits are there to stop people running a server with those OSes. I remember reading a better article on it before, but I cannot remember where I saw it.
I haven't seen anything about limits on 98, but I'd say you'd be leaving the machine open to some interesting crashes if you let that many pcs connect to it

Hobbes

You haven't heard about it WWMan because it doesn't become an issue unless your creating a server. It's rare you would have 10+ connections on a workstation.

Known about it for some time, although it may only apply to windows shares. I haven't tested it. So if you set up say an FTP server it may not apply (WarFTP not IIS).

Warren Contrera

The easy alternative is to use Linux with Samba as the file server. There is no limit to the number of users and it is accessable from Windoze boxes. I have successfully used Clark Connect to accomplish this for many months now and setup is a piece of cake.

Capt'n Midnight

Windows 2000 comes in various flavours
Home / Pro / Server / Advanced Sever / Datacentre Server
Apart from a few extra utils to manage the "extra features" the only difference between them are way the cheaper versions are hobbled, which is shown by the way simple reg hacks can get extra functionality out of them.

Microsoft Licensing sucks

Asok

Its just smb connections as far as I know hobbes you can run ftp with many many connections just fine.

greglo23

to change the default limits in xp sp2 try this tweak. this guy explains it better than me ! http://tinyurl.com/4ntjm

Capt'n Midnight

greglo23 wrote:

to change the default limits in xp sp2 try this tweak. this guy explains it better than me ! http://tinyurl.com/4ntjm

Doesn't add more concurrent connections though.

roamer

Xp Home will only allow max 3 connections at one time

rsynnott

WhiteWashMan wrote:

what?
it stops more than 10 people connectiong at the same time?
do you have any documentation on that as id be interested to see it

I don't think it actually stops them from connecting. It is simply against the terms of the license to connect more than 10. If that's not enough, and you want more, either buy 2003 or use Linux (as a server; you can still have Windows clients)

matt-dublin

It actually does stop them from connecting.
but doesnt always work..

say for example in IIS it only allows 10 similtanious connections from individual machines but each of those machines can connect to multiple sessions
but if ur using bittorrent or kazaa it doesnt work