Problems with Windows Network Discovery

[Jong]

Hi,

I have 2 RT-AX88U's in an AIMesh with wired backhaul. They are on the latest (I believe) 3.0.0.4.388_20558 firmware.

I'm having problems where Windows 11 PCs can no longer find each other by network name (e.g. for file sharing) when on a mix of ethernet and Wifi. Connecting by IP address (\\192.168.x.x) still works as is internet access.

I know basic (non domain) network discovery changed I think with Windows 10. I'm no longer clear what protocol it uses. Rebooting the router makes things work for a bit (no change to the Windows 11 systems) but periodically it seems like the router loses it's ability to track devices across the various interfaces. I realise there are a lot of things involved here, but does this sound possible/likely and is there anything I can do to make this work reliably?

 

[OzarkEdge]

Hi,

I have 2 RT-AX88U's in an AIMesh with wired backhaul. They are on the latest (I believe) 3.0.0.4.388_20558 firmware.

I'm having problems where Windows 11 PCs can no longer find each other by network name (e.g. for file sharing) when on a mix of ethernet and Wifi. Connecting by IP address (\\192.168.x.x) still works as is internet access.

I know basic (non domain) network discovery changed I think with Windows 10. I'm no longer clear what protocol it uses. Rebooting the router makes things work for a bit (no change to the Windows 11 systems) but periodically it seems like the router loses it's ability to track devices across the various interfaces. I realise there are a lot of things involved here, but does this sound possible/likely and is there anything I can do to make this work reliably?

When this has happened to me (rarely), I shutdown all PCs and then bring them up one at a time, starting with mine because it's always ON. But I'm not using Win11 yet.

OE

 

[Jeffrey Young]

I had this issue some time ago. I use AsusWRT Merlin and have always had my router act as the "Master Browser" for my network. Despite having the router force it self as the Master Browser, every once in a while, the same issue you have would come up.

It took me a while, but I finally figured out that my Daughter's Win 10 Pro computer was exerting it self as the "Master Browser" and when it did, the network just kind of got lost as far as finding computers in Network Browser for all computers. Have no idea why just that one computer was being a pain, but after I disabled that computer's ability to become the Master Browser, all has been good.

That was my experience.

 

[Jong]

Thanks for the replies.

So I've been trying to get to the bottom of this all day and still haven't found anything definitive online about how Windows 11 (and latter versions of Windows 10) discovers the local network, now homegroups and master browsers are not used for domain-free networks.

Best I can see Windows 11 uses mDNS for discovery of local hosts and while it seems host announcements of their name and IP seem to propagate over all interfaces, I'm not sure mDNS lookups do - so if the querying PC is on one interface and the PC it is looking for is on another I'm not sure the querying PC will reliably get a response (maybe because it never sees the query??). But if anyone knows more definitively about this it would be very helpful.

Also, I don't understand how the DHCP server option to specify a hostname works on a local network where mDNS is in use. Does this provide a central look up location similar to a master browser and resolve some of these issues or does it add confusion with both the PC being queried potentially replying using mDNS AND the router replying??

Any and all insights appreciated!

 

[Gallo]

anytime my windows box fails to see a share I delete the network device from device manager and re-install it, works everytime