[nfbcs] Does anyone know if it matters?

Sun May 14 19:08:55 UTC 2017

Hi all, for what it is worth on this thread, I'm going to stand behind
the original answer I gave regarding this topic, having two computers
on the same network with the same hostname is not recommended, there
are multiple reasons why it can cause problems, if it does not do so
right now, whose to say that it will not in the month's to come
depending upon the software and hardware which is added to either of
the two computers.
I've been doing desktop support for the last 13 years initially for
Aliant Telco from 2003-2006 and for the provincial government in the
Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador from 2006-present and I
suspect that you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who wouldn't
recommended to change the computername of one of Jim's two devices
even if things may work with conflicting computernames on the network
right now.
I can think of several pieces of software off the top of my head where
conflicting computernames would cause failures and/or issues with
licensing and I'm sure there are others.
Examples include but are not limited to things like: Landesk client,
PowerBuilder, and many others.
Good luck and hth - Ed.

On 5/14/17, Steve Jacobson via nfbcs <nfbcs at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Jim,
>
> First, to change your computer's name in Windows 10, type "Computer Name"
> into the start menu and you will see a settings result to view your PC's
> name.  If you open that up, there will be a rename your computer button.
>
> Perhaps I missed something, but I thought Jim's query was about pairing
> bluetooth devices to different machines that had the same name.  Since I
> believe the Vario display remembers multiple connections, I would think
> that
> having two devices with the same could potentially be a problem, although
> maybe Bluetooth uses additional information to identify machines.  Further,
> I would think that two Windows 10 machines with the same name might cause
> issues if one used Home Group.  Again, both machines would be recognizeable
> by the IP address for network functioning, but one differentiates between
> machines in the Home Group by the computer name.  Even if duplicates are
> allowed, at the very least one would have trouble knowing to which machine
> one was connected to.  Therefore, I would maintain that on a practical
> level, one should avoid duplicate machine names, even if duplicate names
> don't cause errors.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steve Jacobson
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nfbcs [mailto:nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Jack Heim via
> nfbcs
> Sent: Saturday, May 13, 2017 7:10 PM
> To: NFB in Computer Science Mailing List <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: Jack Heim <john at johnheim.com>
> Subject: Re: [nfbcs] Does anyone know if it matters?
>
> Right, just to clarify, the host name comes from the IP address, not the
> other way around. When a machine joins a network, itgets an IP address
> one way or another. It could be assigned one via DHCP or have one
> statically assigned in the operating system. Either way, that IP address
> determines the host name. If the machine thinks it has some other host
> name, it's just wrong. However, Windows used to use the machine name, it
> would not properly be called the host name, as an identifier for the
> wins/netbios protocol. So then the machine name you typed into the
> networking configuration on your Windows machine would matter. I kind of
> doubt that a typical home network would use wins/netbios though.
>
>
> On 05/13/2017 01:08 PM, Littlefield, Tyler via nfbcs wrote:
>> Hello:
>> computer names don't matter in how a computer gets an IP address. You
>> can have two systems with the same name on the same network and it
>> wouldn't matter. It would matter if you were accessing resources on one
>> computer, but that's about it. The name is just the hostname of the
>> computer and is used for some SMB stuff.
>> HTH,
>>
>> On 5/13/2017 2:03 PM, Ed Barnes via nfbcs wrote:
>>> Hi Jim, yes it does matter, two computers can not have the same
>>> computer name if they are ever going to reside on the same wired or
>>> wireless network so you inevitably have to rename one of them.
>>>
>>> It does not matter which computer you rename.
>>>
>>> If you are feeling adventurous you can rename the new windows 10
>>> device as part of your learning process or if you prefer and you're
>>> feeling less adventurous you can simply rename the older windows 7
>>> device.
>>>
>>> Two computers attempting to co-exist on the same network will also
>>> result in an infinite number of packet colisions so they will generate
>>> much more network traffic on your wired or wireless network and
>>> degrade its performance.
>>>
>>> You may also encounter ip address conflicts.
>>>
>>> Sorry I can't speak to how the two computers having the same name
>>> would affect bt connectivity as I don't connect any bt devices to
>>> either of my laptops here at home but I can't imagine that it would be
>>> a good thing.
>>>
>>> All the laptops and desktops I support at work are named according to
>>> the asset sticker we affix to the device when it is initially unboxed
>>> and setup/imaged so every device has an unique name, example the last
>>> device I imaged and setup earlier this week was a Lenovo thinkpad l560
>>> and the asset sticker I put on it was 043628S.
>>>
>>> I also don't have any bt devices at work to use to test this to assist
>>> you further.
>>>
>>> Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
>>>
>>> Best, Ed.
>>>
>>> On 5/13/17, Jim Portillo via nfbcs <nfbcs at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Good morning,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I'm slowly transferring to a newer and faster laptop computer.
> Something's
>>>> come up that I wanted to ask about before trying to connect some
> Bluetooth
>>>> devices.
>>>>
>>>> It turns out that both of these computers turned out to have the same
> name.
>>>> In other words, they're both called Jim's PC.
>>>>
>>>> Would it matter if I wanted to connect something like a VarioUltra to
> both
>>>> of them, considering they both have the same name or would end up
> finding
>>>> the same name?
>>>>
>>>> Would I be better off trying to rename one of them?  Not exactly sure
> where
>>>> to do that in the new Windows 10, but I'm perfectly willing.
>>>>
>>>> I wouldn't want Bluetooth devices to get confused, but at the same
>>>> time,
> I
>>>> wonder if it would matter considering they'd be on different channels.
>>>>
>>>> What do you folks think?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Jim
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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>>
>>
>
> --
> Jack Heim, john at johnheim.com
>
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