mounting shared folders on Win2000

travelgz

Registered
Hi,
Is it possible for me to mount a drive on 10.1 that points to a shared folder on Windows 2000 professional? If so, can someone tell me or direct me somewhere that tells me what I need to do on the Windows2000 side and on the OS X 10.1 (NOT server) side?

Thanks,
G
 
Piece of cake...

In Finder, click 'Go' and 'Connect to server...'. For the url, enter 'smb:/server/share' where the server is the name of the Windows2000 machine, and the share name is the... well share name. If the share name has spaces, like 'My Documents', replace the spaces with %20, so 'My Documents' would become 'My%20Documents'.

Couple of things to note here...

1. The share name must exactly match the actual share name on Win2k. I don't think it's case-sensitive, but must otherwise be identical

2. The server name provided must match the actual server name as defined in the Network Identification. I've had very little luck with using the IP address of the machine to connect with SMB. I'm fortunate enough to have a local DNS server to sort this, but you may have to add an entry in the hosts section of NetInfo.

After you enter these items, you will be prompted for Workgroup/Domain, Username, and Password. These should be entered to match whatever credentials are needed from the Win2k perspective.

Hope this helps...
 
Hmm, the protocol is smb. Does this mean I need smb installed on OS X?

Oh, I don't suppose W2k understands afp protocol, does it? Meaning, doing the reverse and have W2K mount a drive that points to my OS X.

Thanks!
G
 
MacOSX 10.1 already has SMB installed. SMB/CIFS is the native file-sharing bits within Windows, just as AFP is native to Macintosh.

Win2k, though, doesn't understand AFP as a client; only as a server, so although you can connect from 10.1 to Win2k, connecting from Win2k to 10.1 is a bit trickier. That would require some kind of add-on to 10.1 (I think DAVE is supposed to do that). Or, you could get bold and install Samba to serve files up to Win2k...
 
I spent the last two nights trying to get the Go menu to work with my shared folders on my NT machine. I had no luck with any sort of smb:// combination.

What did finally work for me was downloading Sharity. After a bit of tweaking, everything is running great! I recommend the program.



Originally posted by travelgz
That simple method you prescribed, smb://server/share, does that work with Windows NT too?

Thanks,
G
 
Originally posted by travelgz
That simple method you prescribed, smb://server/share, does that work with Windows NT too?

Thanks,
G

I don't see any reason that it shouldn't. BTW, others have mentioned Sharity. It seems like a reasonably functional product, and it seems to work really well, but I think the licensing terms/costs are a bit out of line, particularly since Apple is certainly not going to stand still. Apple will, I have no doubt, improve on the functionality of SMB connectivity (hopefully in both directions) in the coming months...
 
Windows 2000 DOES do AFP. It actualy does AFP/IP So that is a big plus over NT!! I have found that I get MUCH faster transfers from my W2K server using AFP than I do using SMB. Both work fine, just AFP is faster.

My OSX Server 10.04 on a g4 450 is actualy faster than my Dual 1GHZ P4 (serving to both Mac and windows!).

The P4 has 1 gig of ram. The Mac 512. Both Have Gigabit ethernet to a 10/100 switch with dual gigabit uplinks.

Cant wait to see what it does when I get 10.1 on that puppy!!
 
Originally posted by Jorace
Windows 2000 DOES do AFP. It actualy does AFP/IP So that is a big plus over NT!! I have found that I get MUCH faster transfers from my W2K server using AFP than I do using SMB. Both work fine, just AFP is faster.

Yes Win2K does do AFP. But, as I said earlier, only as a server; there is no option in Windows Explorer to connect to an AFP volume, nor will Microsoft ever provide an option to do so. Also, the ability to present AFP volumes is only available in the Server, Advanced Server, and Data Center flavours. What's missing? Professional (AKA Workstation). So, having Pro means having to use SMB or DAV.

I agree, Win2K is much better at AFP than NT ever was. The performance difference between AFP and SMB is mostly due to the fact that MacOSX is much better with AFP than SMB. Using SMB to copy files between 2 Windows machines is as fast as using AFP between two MacOSX machines.
 
I've been having a hard time keeping my AppleTalk zones they seem to come and go like rain, but SMB has worked great soon as I found out if you have a domain on your network how you deal with that. example : SMB://DOMAIN;servername/sharename.........hope this helps someone!
 
OK, so from what I've gathered, the only way to connect to an NT machine from an OS X machine is through Sharity, and unlike a charity, Sharity isnt free, which means, there is no way to do this without taking out my credit card, yes? (No legal way, I mean).

Sigh.
G
 
There is another was to connect from a Win2k box to a 10.1 box: use sftp. (Don't confuse this with normal ftp. Normal ftp sends everything, including your username and password, in clear text. sftp is entirely encrypted). If you activate "remote login" in the Sharing pane of system preferences in 10.1, it activates both ssh AND sftp on your mac (I haven't seen this mentioned elsewhere). Then, using a nice GUI sftp client on the Win2k box (see http://www.ssh.com ) you can transfer files to/from your Mac. It only gives you access to your home directory, but it may be possible to circumvent this using aliases or symlinks to other directories (I haven't tried this yet).

Also, I've read elsewhere that if you had DAVE installed before you upgraded to 10.1, it can cause problems with the native SMB networking. Some of the users in this thread who reported problems may want to look into that.

Originally posted by kenny
Win2k, though, doesn't understand AFP as a client; only as a server, so although you can connect from 10.1 to Win2k, connecting from Win2k to 10.1 is a bit trickier. That would require some kind of add-on to 10.1 (I think DAVE is supposed to do that). Or, you could get bold and install Samba to serve files up to Win2k...
 
Originally posted by kenny
Piece of cake...

In Finder, click 'Go' and 'Connect to server...'...

Tried it. Ain't working.

I have a G4, a Win98 box, and a Win2K box. (a Linux box, too, but I'm not even ready to go there yet...) No domains, but both Win boxen have the same workgroup name set, which shows on both of them under Entire Network , so they seem to be set up properly. The Win2K box is set up for TCP networking only.

On the G4, I can mount shares on the 98 box just fine. The 98 box and the 2000 box can mount each other just dandy. The G4 cannot mount anything on the Win2K box, no matter how muuch I beg and plead.

I've tried every imaginable permutation: with and without the workgroup name, with and without a username, with and without a password, a named share, C$ as a share, with and without a trailing "/", etc.

Not a damn thing has worked.

Has anybody here actually gotten this to work with Win2K? Not Win98, not WinNT, not WinME, but Windows 2000 Pro? Is there something special that must be done on the Win2K box that I don't know about?

Anybody? Hello? Anybody? In the back? Beuller?
 
I have it working fine with Win 2k. It does work, I just can;t figure out what I have done differently to you. Currently I'm trying to get connected to Win XP - no luck yet...
 
Originally posted by RevEvs
I have it working fine with Win 2k. It does work, I just can;t figure out what I have done differently to you. Currently I'm trying to get connected to Win XP - no luck yet...

Kewl... so there is hope after all :{)

Coupla questions...

Is your 2000 box in an NT domain? I'm not. But thinking about it, I have a suspicion that perhaps 2000 wants to authenticate the SMB user/password against a domain, rather than the local machine. No domain controller, no access. Mine hangs for at least a full minute before I get an error, which would make sense if the Win2K box was busy looking for a domain controller that wasn't there...

Are you behind a NAT router? All my boxes are on a LAN connected by a Linksys broadband router, sharing my cable modem. I've read a couple of posts elsewhere that claim NAT could be causing problems, but without any useful details.
 
I created a shared folder on my Windows XP machine (Works under 2000 too). Then I went to my Mac running OS X 10.1 and chose GO --> Connect to Server. In the Address field I typed the following: smb://<computer_name>/<share_name>/ Example: smb://mycomputer/public/ Then I clicked the "Connect" button.

OS X then prompted me for the name of the workgroup that the Windows computer was a member of, and the userid and password for the share.

This worked fine for me! I didn't have to add anything anywhere else on the OS X box. I don't run a DNS server, and didn't need to.

However, there is one thing that you need to do on the PC side that not many have mentioned (Not that I have seen anyways). Make sure you have NetBIOS installed for your network connection. I tried for ages to get SMB working, and it didn't until I installed NetBIOS on my XP machine.

Please try installing NetBIOS. If it is installed, and still not working please forgive this post. If NetBIOS does allow you to get SMB to work, please post back here and let me and everyone know.

Thanks,

JVB
 
Originally posted by vanbuskirk
Please try installing NetBIOS. If it is installed, and still not working please forgive this post. If NetBIOS does allow you to get SMB to work, please post back here and let me and everyone know.
Hey, I'm willing to give it a try. But I can't find how to install NetBIOS in Win2K. Any clues?
 
Not sure exactly where NetBIOS can be installed from. You should just be able to open up the properties for your connection and then click add protocol or install or something like that. With XP NetBIOS gets installed with NWLink IPX/SPX/NetBIOS Compatible Transport Protocol.

I just tried disabling NetBIOS over TCP/IP on my ThinkPad and I could no longer connect to my shared folder from the Mac.

Regards,

JVB
 
Originally posted by vanbuskirk
Not sure exactly where NetBIOS can be installed from. You should just be able to open up the properties for your connection and then click add protocol or install or something like that. With XP NetBIOS gets installed with NWLink IPX/SPX/NetBIOS Compatible Transport Protocol.
WOO freakin HOO!! You rule :{D

That did it, alright. For the rest of ya:

Win2K:

Start > Settings > Network and Dial-up Connections, right click on your LAN connection and select "Properties"

Under the protocal list, click the button that reads "Install..."

Select "Protocol" from the list, click "Add..."

Wait while Windoze eats up a few bazillion CPU cycles for no apparent reason...

Select the option that reads "NWLink IPX/SPX/NetBIOS Compatible Transport Protocol"

Make sure you have the Win2K CD in the drive, and click "OK"

After some more wasted CPU cycles, you should now be back at the "Local Area Connection properties" panel. Click "OK"

Go back to your Mac, Command-K, smb://pcname/sharename, and hot dang, it WORKS.
 
I am glad that that worked for you. I assume that this will fix a lot of the SMB connection problems that people have been experiencing.

Enjoy!

JVB
 
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