From: "Lee B." <leeb00 at gmail dot com>

> Ok, here's an odd one... Not sure if its a M0n0wall problem or not (home 
> network: Cablemodem-> m0n0wall_1.22-> several_computers_on_lan)

> One Windows XP machine often won't connect to shares on other machines 
> that are on the LAN.(connect network drive \\hostname\sharename) BUT if I 
> *ping* the IP of that machine (the PC with the share I'm trying to connect 
> to), and THEN connect to the share using the hostname, it works every 
> time!

> So, I can always connect to the shares using the IP, and I can connect 
> using the netbios name IF I ping the server first. Anyone heard of this 
> before?

Yep.  When you ping it, you both do a NetBIOS name exchange.  Chalk it up to 
Microsoft designing NetBIOS naming while drinking heavily.  You need a wins 
server, a lmhost file, or to "register DHCP leases" in the m0n0wall dns 
forwarder.

                        Lee