Change full computer name?

Change full computer name?

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer as
“OLDLABTOP� (capital letters!).
When I right click on OLDLABTOP and explore, I get the message: windows
cannot access //OLDLABTOP, check spelling.

The OS of OLDLABTOP is Windows XP. Clicking there “Start�, right clicking
“My Computer� and clicking “Properties� and “ Computer Name�, I see computer
description is OLDLABTOP, but full computer name is Oldlabtop .
Clicking on “Change� to replace the computer name Oldlabtop by OLDLABTOP,
does not work, because the “OK� button is faded out.

How can I change the full computer name?

Thanks in advance, Gerhard

Gerhard wrote:

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer as
“OLDLABTOP” (capital letters!).

You said "vista".

This ain't a Vista group.

It is a windows XP problem. Please, read on.
"Uncle Grumpy" wrote:

Gerhard wrote:

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer as
“OLDLABTOP� (capital letters!).

You said "vista".

This ain't a Vista group.

"Gerhard" wrote in message
...
Change full computer name?

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer as
“OLDLABTOP� (capital letters!).
When I right click on OLDLABTOP and explore, I get the message: windows
cannot access //OLDLABTOP, check spelling.

The OS of OLDLABTOP is Windows XP. Clicking there “Start�, right clicking
“My Computer� and clicking “Properties� and “ Computer Name�, I
see computer
description is OLDLABTOP, but full computer name is Oldlabtop .
Clicking on “Change� to replace the computer name Oldlabtop by OLDLABTOP,
does not work, because the “OK� button is faded out.

How can I change the full computer name?

Thanks in advance, Gerhard



First off, what's displayed next to "Full computer name" and "Computer
description" refer to two different things. They're not related. A computer name
is mandatory. That's how it's identified on your network. A computer description
is optional. It's displayed in the Comments column in My Network Places. You can
change the information displayed in the computer description box to whatever you
like and it will have no effect on the full computer name. The computer
description has no impact on your ability to access the XP system from the Vista
computer.

Next, computer names are not case sensitive. When naming an XP computer,
OLDLABTOP and Oldlabtop are the same. That's why you can't click on the OK
switch. You're not making any changes to the name of your XP system. Also, Vista
will display all workgroup computers with names in upper case. Case makes no
difference.

Bottom line, the reason you can't access the XP computer from the Vista machine
has nothing to do with the computer name. What you're experiencing is often
caused by a firewall on the XP machine that's not configured properly to allow
sharing on the local network. Check the security software on the XP system.

If you're still unable to access the XP computer after checking the firewall
settings, you might want to post your question to the XP Networking and the Web
or Vista Networking and Sharing newsgroups.

Good luck

Nepatsfan

"Gerhard" wrote in message
...
Change full computer name?

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer as
“OLDLABTOP� (capital letters!).
When I right click on OLDLABTOP and explore, I get the message: windows
cannot access //OLDLABTOP, check spelling.

The OS of OLDLABTOP is Windows XP. Clicking there “Start�, right clicking
“My Computer� and clicking “Properties� and “ Computer Name�, I see
computer
description is OLDLABTOP, but full computer name is Oldlabtop .
Clicking on “Change� to replace the computer name Oldlabtop by OLDLABTOP,
does not work, because the “OK� button is faded out.

How can I change the full computer name?

Thanks in advance, Gerhard

The problem you're having doesn't likely have to do with the computer name,
but with firewalls and/or permissions.

You may also find that on the Vista system the problem can be addressed by
(at least temporarily) removing IPv6 from the network adapter. You may
also find that installing the demo version of Network Magic and running it -
on both systems - can help.

The change in case for the computer name isn't the issue - this is sent to
uppercase by default, I believe the function is called "prettypath". If
you can't change it on the XP machine you may not be logged in as
Administrator level.

HTH
-pk

"Gerhard" wrote in message
...
Change full computer name?

In a local network, the vista desktop sees another network computer
as
“OLDLABTOP� (capital letters!).
When I right click on OLDLABTOP and explore, I get the message:
windows
cannot access //OLDLABTOP, check spelling.

The OS of OLDLABTOP is Windows XP. Clicking there “Start�, right
clicking
“My Computer� and clicking “Properties� and “ Computer
Name�, I see computer
description is OLDLABTOP, but full computer name is Oldlabtop .
Clicking on “Change� to replace the computer name Oldlabtop by
OLDLABTOP,
does not work, because the “OK� button is faded out.

How can I change the full computer name?


The OK button only becomes enabled if there is a change in the value
of the string. If you are using NetBIOS (ports 137-139) to access a
remote host, case is ignored. Personally I don't use uppercase when
entering a hostname; i.e., I use all lowercase. For example, even if
I enter "MyHost", running the 'hostname' and 'ipconfig /all' commands
return "myhost" so I see no point in using uppercase characters.
Character string comparisons are supposed to be performed in a case
insensitive manner. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hostname,
"Restrictions on valid host names".

If the OK button won't enable when you change to all lowercase
(because the case insensitive string value has not changed), just
enter some different hostname as a temporary value and then rename
back to what you want. Since there is no difference in recognizing a
host with mixed case, you need to change to something completely
different for a hostname.