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I used to have a network share on an external Samba server named mysmb. The network share itself was accessed via \\mysmb\myshare.

I connected to it from my new Windows 8.1 laptop, copied its content to a local folder (same name), then shared it. So far so good. I can access it from my laptop the old SMB way, using 127.0.0.1\myshare.

I now want to access this local share the old way: \\mysmb\myshare.

For that, I changed c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts to point mysmb to 127.0.0.1 by adding the line:

127.0.0.1   mysmb

I can now ping mysmb fine, returning pings from the very same laptop (i.e. not that Samba server, as it has been turned off).

But if I try to access mysmb as a share, i.e. \\mysmb\myshare, "Windows Security" keeps prompting me for "Enter network credentials".

Which tells me that my laptop's Windows 8.1 somehow remembers the old IP address of the mysmb computer name.

I tried deleting all cached IPs using arp -a -d then rebooting, but that didn't help.

In Windows 2000/XP there used to be a view called My Network Places that memorized & listed all previously used connections. If I delete one, this would prevent the "Duplicate Name Exists" Error.

Where does Windows 8.1 store this kind of caching and how can I make it forget that history?

ih8ie8
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  • I think I know what you are trying to do but unfortunately this won't work with NETBIOS crap. In TCP/IP (`etc/hosts`) you can give multiple names to the same IP address and this would work flawlessly. NETBIOS, however only allows **one** computer name (that's the name you see listed in the WORKGROUP). If it's different that the `mysmb` you are trying to access, you're SOL. – Bill The Ape Feb 08 '15 at 19:24
  • Oh wait a minute... perhaps [this article](http://blogs.technet.com/b/josebda/archive/2010/06/04/multiple-names-for-one-computer-consolidate-your-smb-file-servers-without-breaking-unc-paths.aspx) can help you? – Bill The Ape Feb 08 '15 at 19:27

1 Answers1

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Flush your dns cache. 

Ipconfig /flushdns

If your computer is contacting the wrong address, flushing dns should do the trick.

Doing the arp command removes cached Mac addresses rather than dns entries, which is why I think this would work while the previous did not.

FoxDeploy
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