🚀 go-pugleaf

Gunter Herrmann wrote:
>
> Since it is about using a router NetBEUI is completely useless.
> Unlike TCP/IP and SPX/IPX, NetBEUI is NOT routable.

You are correct that NetBEUI is not routable, but the "broadband routers"
available on the market today use a router only for the LAN to WAN
connection. The LAN is still serviced by a switch or a hub, so non-routable
protocols still pass on the LAN.

HOWEVER, just because it does work is no reason to install it. TCP/IP will
work on these networks as well. If it doesn't, then something is
misconfigured. Adding a second protocol doesn't fix the problem. It just
works around it. One or the other protocol is going to be the default
protocol. Let's look at the options:

If TCP/IP is the default protocol, then TCP/IP communications will be
attempted first, and until they fail or time-out, NetBEUI won't be used. If
NetBEUI is the default protocol, then NetBEUI communications will be
attempted first, and TCP/IP won't be attempted until NetBEUI fails.

So while previous posters have noted that NetBEUI is a great little protocol
for small LAN's, it was designed with the assumption that it would be the
primary protocol, or perhaps secondary to IPX/SPX on a Novel network. The
Internet was something that existed, but most LAN's weren't even connected
to the Internet. In those days, NetBEUI was the perfect solution to simple
networking.

The situation today is different. TCP/IP is so integrated in Windows XP that
it cannot be uninstalled through the GUI, and it cannot be made to be the
secondary protocol to NetBEUI. NetBEUI is so much out of the picture that
they buried it on the CD, and didn't make allowances for it to be installed
through the GUI.

The solution to having a LAN where TCP/IP is not working for internal
communications is to fix TCP/IP. Installing NetBEUI is like putting a sign
on your front door telling people to go around back instead of fixing the
way the front door sticks. It may be a temporary work-around, but it's not a
solution.

--
Warren H.

==========
Disclaimer: My views reflect those of myself, and not my employer, my
friends, nor (as she often tells me) my wife. Any resemblance to the views
of anybody living or dead is coincidental. No animals were hurt in the
writing of this response -- unless you count my dog who desperately wants to
go outside now.