chjamil
asked on
network not working porperly
We have small network having 5 computers(XP professional for sever and win 2000 professional for clients), we have developed a workgroup to share internet and files.From a week its happening that computers are not visible to other users on workgroup.
One worst thing is that network card donot work properly, once they work fine but on the other time they will say "network cable unpluged". But the cable was in, and if u restart it 4 or 5 times then there is a chance that it will be okay. But it did not show any computer in workgroup except itself.
One more thing that is it a good habit to allocate IP addresses dynamically, or give them manually to all comoputers attached.
thanks
Jamil
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In response to your second question, it really depends on what you are trying to accomplish, whether or not you use static or dynamic IPs. In your situation, with such a small network, static IPs would be fine. Generally the reason people use Dynamic IPs is because it reduces administrative overhead. With Dynamic IPs you configure one DHCP server, and users can plug millions of computers in and out of the network, without having to know a thing about the addressing scheme. This is also benificial if you have settings that change. For example, with Statically assigned IPs, if your Gateway or your DNS server changes addresses (for whatever reason) you now have to go to every node in your network and change those addresses. With Dynamic IPs, the most you might have to do is reboot a few machines. Much simpler. DHCP does, however, have drawbacks. First, if the DHCP server goes down, none of the computers on the network will get an IP. If your gateway is also your DHCP server, and all you use is the internet, this tends not to matter, because if you gateway goes down, there's nothing to address anyway. Additionally, there is the hassle of setting up a DHCP server itself, including the hassle of purchasing one (if that is required for your application). With static IPs of course, you need to keep track of each IP as to not duplicate any of them, but if you only have 5 computers, this is not too difficult. So unless you have users that use laptops, that plug and unplug them frequently (use them at home, etc.) dynamic IPs may prove to be more hassle than it's worth. Although, in my opinion, setting up a DHCP server is fun, so I have a DHCP server for my three PCs at home, but on the scale that you describe, it really all is just a matter of personal preference.