Network Tools Help Us!

IPCONFIG or WINIPCFG
NBTSTAT
Ping and Tracert

Command-Line Utilities
Network Utilities from Resource Kits

To confirm that your computer has the appropriate settings for DNS and WINS servers, an available IP address, the proper subnet mask, the proper default gateway, and the correct host name, you can use ipconfig/all or WINIPCFG tool. The following are list of ipconfig parameters and usage:

/? - Display this help message
/all - Display full configuration information
/release - Release the IP address for the specified adapter
/renew - Renew the IP address for the specified adapter
/flushdns - Purge the DNS resolve cache. The /flushdns switch flushes the list of locally cached DNS names. When a name is resolved from DNS, the client keeps it in the cache temporarily. This option removes the cached entries.
/registerdns - Refresh all DHCP leases and re-register DNS names. The /registerdns switch allows the client to re-register its dynamic DNS entries as well as renew the DHCP lease.
/displaydns - Display the contents of the DNS resolve cache. The /displaydns switch lists the contents of your resolved DNS name cache.

The first four switches are for OS those in Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 and earlier version.

How to send ipconfig /all results to a text file

You might want to use the IP Configuration data of the local area connection that you obtained by using the IPConfig tool for further analysis. To make it easier to use, you can send the results to a text file. At the command line, type ipconfig /all > <local drive>:\<document title.txt>, for example ipconfig /all c:\>ipconfig.txt.

NBTSTAT

Nbtstat.exe is a useful tool for troubleshooting NetBIOS name resolution problems. You can use the nbtstat.exe command to remove or correct preloaded entries.

· To list the NetBIOS table of the local computer, type nbtstat -n at the command prompt, and then press ENTER. This command displays the names that were registered locally on the computer by programs such as the server and redirector.

· To list the contents of the NetBIOS name cache, type nbtstat -c at the command prompt, and then press ENTER. This command shows the NetBIOS name cache, which contains name-to-address mappings for other computers.

· To purge the name cache and reload it from the LMHOSTS file, type nbtstat -r at the command prompt, and then press ENTER.

· To perform a NetBIOS adapter status command against the computer that you specify by name, type nbtstat -a NetBIOS computer name at the command prompt, and then press ENTER. The adapter status command returns the local NetBIOS name table for that computer and the MAC address of the network adapter.

· To display a list of client and server connections, type nbtstat -s at the command prompt, and then press ENTER. This command lists the current NetBIOS sessions and their status, including statistics, as shown in the following example:

   NetBIOS Connection Table

For example, to find out if your local machine is running NetBEUI/NetBIOS, type nbtstat -n on the computer. If it shows 'type' of '<20>', it is using NetBIOS. For a remote computer, type nbtstat -a computername or nbtstat -A IP.

Ping and Tracert

If you are unable to contact to a remote server, there are two common tools that you can use. Use the `ping` command to verify that a host computer can connect to the TCP/IP network and network resources. Use the `tracert` command to examine the route taken to a destination.

To Test Connections by Using Ping.exe

If you can ping a remote computer's IP but not the ComputerName (Time out), this is likely caused by a name resolution failure, rather than network connectivity. You need to check the network settings such as DHCP, DNS, WINS and NetBIOS over TCP/IP.

If you cannot ping both IP and ComputerName, 1) Ping the loopback address (by using the ping 127.0.0.1 command) to verify that TCP/IP is installed and working correctly on the local computer. 2) Ping the IP address of the local computer to verify that it was added to the network correctly. 3) Ping the IP address of the default gateway to verify that the gateway is functional and it is possible to connect to a local host on the local network. You can obtain the IP address of the local default gateway by using the ipconfig /renew command. 4) Ping the IP address of another remote host to verify that you can communicate through a router.

To Test Connections by Using Tracert.exe

Tracert.exe is a route-tracing utility that you can use to determine the network path to a destination. To determine the path that a packet takes on the network and where that path may be ending.

For example, your LAN works fine but no one can access the Internet. You may want to use tracert to determine the network path to a Internet destination like yahoo.com before you call your ISP. You can use tracert to examine the results to determine the length of time that the packet took to reach each network segment and the point at which the connection may stop working.

PathPing display all routers along the way

Using PathPing can displays information for the destination computer and all routers along the way. For example, to display the information of all router paths to yahoo.com, use command pathping yahoo.com.

NET VIEW

You can use `net view \\`computername command to test a network connection. Net view command will display a list of the file and print shares of a computer that is running Windows 2000 is generated by establishing a temporary NetBIOS connection.

If there are no file or print shares available on the specified computer, you receive a "There are no entries in the list." message. If the command (net view \\computername) does not work, use `net view \\`IP address of the remote computer. If net view \\ip works, but a net view attempt to the computer name does not work, the computer name may be resolving to the wrong address.

To list all computers are running on the network, type net view only (or net view /domain:domainname for each domain). That will show all computers.

Notes:

If you can contact an Internet resource directly, but "Ping" the Internet IP gets "Request Timed Out". That is because many organizations block the return of ICMP (ping) packets as a security measure.

What is netdiag for

Netdiag is a command-line diagnostic tool that you can use to test network connectivity. It performs a series of tests to determine the state and functionality of your network client. You can use the results of these tests and network status information that is provided by Netdiag to help you isolate network and connectivity problems on your Windows 2000-based workstation or server computer.

Netdiag is included with the Windows 2000 Support Tools. To install the Support Tools, run Setup.exe from the Support\Tools folder on the Windows 2000 CD-ROM. To download Netdiag, visit the following Microsoft Web site: http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/tools/existing/netdiag-o.asp

Command-line utilities

Viewing configuration by using ipconfig /all or winipcfg

When troubleshooting a TCP/IP networking problem, you can use the ipconfig command to get host computer configuration information, including the IP address, subnet mask, and default gateway. If it is running Win9x, ME, use winipcfg instead.

Refreshing configuration by using ipconfig /renew

When troubleshooting a TCP/IP networking problem, you can use the ipconfig /renew command to renew all network adapters on the computer that uses DHCP (except those that are manually configured) try to contact a DHCP server and renew their existing configuration or obtain a new configuration. You can also use the ipconfig command with the /release option to immediately release the current DHCP configuration for a host. For Win9x and ME, use the release and renew options of the winipcfg command instead of ipconfig /release and ipconfig /renew to perform manual release or renewal of the IP configuration lease for a client.

Flush and re-register WINS and DNS

To flush the NetBIOS cache, use nbtstat -R, and to re-registers with WINS, use nbtstat -RR.

To flushes the DNS cache, use ipconfig /flushdns, and re-registers with DNS, use ipconfig /registerdns.

Network Utilities from Resource Kits

CConnect.exe - Monitor user connections to servers and which system they are logging in to.

CConnect.exe can perform the following functions:

Limit concurrent connections per user.
Log off remote computers when concurrent connections are reached.
List all computers that a user is logged on to.
List logon servers for each user.
Show how many users are logged on to a domain controller (DC).
Force a logoff when concurrent connections are reached.
Enable debugging of the CConnect tool.
Write events to the event log of a specified server concerning the status of the CConnect tool.
Save all lists to a file for further examination.
Track the last user of the computer and only limit that user from logging on to the computer if the computer was shut down improperly.

dhcploc.exe - Locates DHCP servers on the network.

lockflop.exe - Locks the floppy drive so that users cannot read floppy disk.

logoff.exe - Log off a user.

nlmom.exe - Tests and debugs trust relationships between domains.

netclip.exe - Views the Clipboard on a remote system nd can be copied to the local system to.

rcmd.Excutes command-line commands on local and remote systems.

srvcheck.exe - List the non-administrative shares on a remote system and return the ACLs on those shares.

usrstat.exe - Lists the user information (username, full name, last logon time in a domain.

winscl.exe - Checks the WINS database information.

Click for help

Your feedback and contributions to this web site