is there a way to circumvent the maximum 10 shares (concurrent connections) per winxp machine?

[tami]

i share a lot of folders on my winxp pro sp2 machine, and i mount them via samba to access them in my linux machine. i've recently been adding on harddrive space which translates to the desire to share more folders and to mount them efficiently on my linux box. naturally, if i go over the 10 share limit, i get smb mounting errors. i'd like to do without that.

is there a registry tweak or hack that will enable me to do so? can i do away with the maximum 10 concurrnet connections, or do i have no choice but to deal with it?

thanks!

edit: naturally, there are questions about the legitimacy of my inquiry and the possibility of violating my EULA as a windows xp user. i am not trying to circumvent any legal agreement but rather am trying to understand if there's a way to minimize the number of concurrent connections (right now each distinct share mounted in samba counts as a connection). please read the discussion first since i am of the opinion that it has deviated much since it was first posted in the morning.

 

[TonyRic]

switch the windows machine to linux and use samba?

 

[tami]

:roll:

i'd like help, not ridiculous suggestions. thank you.

 

[mitmot]

*inserts ridiculous suggestion*

 

[superjohnyo]

http://blog.davidkaspar.com/archives/20...4/windows_xp_sp2_and_event_id_4226.php

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: superjohnyo
http://blog.davidkaspar.com/archives/20...4/windows_xp_sp2_and_event_id_4226.php

That's not what she's talking about.

Tami, I don't think there's a way to circumvent the 10 share limit in XP. Perhaps you can share the entire drive rather than each individual folder?

 

[tami]

/me slaps mitmot. i knew you'd do that.

yup, mrchad, i was hoping that wasn't the answer. there's a way to get around one logon per desktop, which was greatly surprising to me, so i was hoping there'd be a way around this. i sincerely hope there is.

 

[nweaver]

mount -t smbfs -o username=user,password=password //ip.of.desktop/c$ /mnt/cdrive


unless you have more then 10 drive letters...

and why is suggesting a move to linux/Samba a joke? You do realize, XP does not have the 10 connection limit incoming, right? So pop the drive in your linux machine, and share it that way, mount a network drive on windows.

 

[superjohnyo]

There's a hack that changes XP from workstation to server called NTSwitch, but supposedly it has a memory leak.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/03/25/registry_hack_turns_xp_pro/

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: nweaver
mount -t smbfs -o username=user,password=password //ip.of.desktop/c$ /mnt/cdrive


unless you have more then 10 drive letters...

and why is suggesting a move to linux/Samba a joke? You do realize, XP does not have the 10 connection limit incoming, right? So pop the drive in your linux machine, and share it that way, mount a network drive on windows.

nweaver, i'm sharing a bunch of folders across 6 drives. putting in one drive will not work. it's arranged this way for very specific reasons.

and yes, i can mount fine using mount -t smbfs etcetc. however, once i have more than 10 shares in /etc/fstab, i can't do mount -a to mount additional shares (usually on the bottom on /etc/fstab), naturally, because there's a limit (10) to the number of shares in XP. i also cannnot access my shares from other machines either, because it's actively being used on my linux box.

that's an XP limitation. there should be a way around it.

 

[CTho9305]

Isn't it a license violation to do that?

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: CTho9305
Isn't it a license violation to do that?

i suppose it could be, but that isn't stopping the discussion about it circulating on the internet.

i don't want to do anything that would render my system unstable, but i don't really work in a "server" environment which would warrant the need to upgrade to 2k3.

i believe that having this ability to have more than 10 drive shares should not be a license violation. but what do i know?

i'd still like to know if it's possible to do safely.

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: tami

Originally posted by: CTho9305
Isn't it a license violation to do that?

i suppose it could be, but that isn't stopping the discussion about it circulating on the internet.

i don't want to do anything that would render my system unstable, but i don't really work in a "server" environment which would warrant the need to upgrade to 2k3.

i believe that having this ability to have more than 10 drive shares should not be a license violation. but what do i know?

i'd still like to know if it's possible to do safely.

It is a license violation. XP and Server 2003 share a great deal of kernel components, but XP has several restrictions (including the concurrent share limitation) that prevent it from being used as a server operating system.

 

[kobymu]

is ftp (the one that come with xp - IIS) a valid solution in you'r case?

/edit
.. ftp >hosting< (..

 

[tami]

frustrating

i'd even pay microsoft for this functionality, but i don't want to pay for a whole new OS.

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: kobymu
is ftp (the one that come with xp - IIS) a valid solution in you'r case?

/edit
.. ftp >hosting< (..

nah, unfortunately that wouldn't work as far as i am aware... it's all through samba. i still want it to be as secure as possible (i'm not such a fan of IIS and i'm loyal to apache on my linux box)

thanks for the suggestion though!

 

[Cooler]

I think theres Registry edit that you can do to alow up to 50 I had friend who did that once.

 

[superjohnyo]

Just so I understand exactly whats happening:

You have box1(XP) with multiple drives, and multiple (more than 10) folders that are shared.

You have box2(linux) using samba to mount the shared folders as drives.

After mounting 10 of the shared folders as drives, you cannot mount any more? As in, you ask samba to go find a folder and to mount it, but it is denied access?

If so, wouldnt this still be a problem for 2 XP machines (one sharing, one mounting)? If so, I will try a few things after work and see what I can do.

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: superjohnyo
Just so I understand exactly whats happening:

You have box1(XP) with multiple drives, and multiple (more than 10) folders that are shared.

You have box2(linux) using samba to mount the shared folders as drives.

After mounting 10 of the shared folders as drives, you cannot mount any more? As in, you ask samba to go find a folder and to mount it, but it is denied access?

If so, wouldnt this still be a problem for 2 XP machines (one sharing, one mounting)? If so, I will try a few things after work and see what I can do.

yes. that is precisely the problem. if i am mounting more than 10 drives, i cannot access my shares via other XP machines either (with the error message "you have reached the maximum concurrent sessions allowed," if i recall)

so sharing is limited to 10 drives (shares, connections, whatever you want to call it) unfortunately...

 

[superjohnyo]

I've got an extra box that I'll attack tonight and see what I can do.

 

[tami]

thanks. it's greatly appreciated.

it's interesting to watch as you try to mount 11 or more shares in linux... it hangs for a bit and there's an smbfs error, but if you view the mounted drives, you'll see that the first 10 are mounted (provided that there are no other active shares).

 

[kobymu]

I would suggest looking for a third party solution that can consolidate the sharing (don't know of one that can do that but I wouldn't be surprised if something like that existed).

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: kobymu
I would suggest looking for a third party solution that can consolidate the sharing (don't know of one that can do that but I wouldn't be surprised if something like that existed).

i'd consider that as well, although i think it's an inherent problem in the OS itself. (although microsoft problem wouldn't call it a "problem" but rather a "justifiable limitation for a personal OS" from what i'm reading)

 

[kobymu]

Originally posted by: tami
... (although microsoft problem wouldn't call it a "problem" but rather a "justifiable limitation for a personal OS" from what i'm reading)

one of my friends once had a problem that really annoyed him (cant remember what it was though) , so after about half an hour in Microsoft knowledge base I found that (quote from Microsoft knowledge base) "this behavior is by design" so I went back too him and told him the exact quote and he looked at me all confused and said "I don?t get it, they make windows annoying on purpose?"

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: kobymu

Originally posted by: tami
... (although microsoft problem wouldn't call it a "problem" but rather a "justifiable limitation for a personal OS" from what i'm reading)

one of my friends once had a problem that really annoyed him (cant remember what it was though) , so after about half an hour in Microsoft knowledge base I found that (quote from Microsoft knowledge base) "this behavior is by design" so I went back too him and told him the exact quote and he looked at me all confused and said "I don?t get it, they make windows annoying on purpose?"

yep... they are trying to inconvenience us all.