Cause
To find a server, Windows has various mechanisms it can use. Unfortunately some home routers seem to provide, via DHCP, information that forces Windows 7 in particular to become a "peer-to-peer" node, which means it needs a WINS server to find anything else on the same local network.
Remidiation
Fortunately this can be easily controlled from a simple registry change to change the networking configuration to mixed mode, which broadcasts first and then deferres to other mechanisms (DNS and WINS). The single registry setting change can be applied from here.
After merging the registry entries, restart the computer and all local machines should now be accessible![:)]()
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My thanks for Skimmer for providing the node-type reminder for this fix!
To find a server, Windows has various mechanisms it can use. Unfortunately some home routers seem to provide, via DHCP, information that forces Windows 7 in particular to become a "peer-to-peer" node, which means it needs a WINS server to find anything else on the same local network.
Remidiation
Fortunately this can be easily controlled from a simple registry change to change the networking configuration to mixed mode, which broadcasts first and then deferres to other mechanisms (DNS and WINS). The single registry setting change can be applied from here.
After merging the registry entries, restart the computer and all local machines should now be accessible
-------
My thanks for Skimmer for providing the node-type reminder for this fix!