That article should be taken out and SHOT. Microsoft doesn't change it because it's easier for PSS to say "install WINS" than it is to explain how to properly configure short name resolution.
This is the key paragraph - throw the rest of it away: Exchange 2003 uses Windows name resolution APIs to look up "short names," also known as NetBIOS names. Therefore, the server expects to resolve short names during operation, the ESM client expects to resolve short names when contacting servers, and Outlook clients that are earlier than Outlook 2003 expect to resolve the short name of a server. Unless all clients and servers are on the same subnet, the easiest way for short name resolution to work is to set up a WINS server. As long as short name resolution works properly - throughout the Exchange involved part of your forest - Exchange 2003 does NOT need NetBIOS. Many multi-national companies are running without it. ________________________________ From: Sean Martin [seanmarti...@gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, May 05, 2009 11:32 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: Disabling NETBIOS Here is Microsoft's list of Exchange 2000 and Exchange 2003's NetBIOS dependencies. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/837391 - Sean On Tue, May 5, 2009 at 5:27 AM, Ken Schaefer <k...@adopenstatic.com<mailto:k...@adopenstatic.com>> wrote: No - DNS suffixes can be appended transparently for you Secondly, Exchange 2003 doesn't have a dependancy on NetBIOS that I know of. MS Cluster service had a dependancy on NetBIOS name resolution (e.g. via WINS), but that isn't an Exchange dependancy. I don't know of any current Microsoft NetBIOS dependancies - I know a number of people reasonably sized orgs with no WINS, so at best NetBIOS would local collision domain only. Happy to be enlightened though. Cheers Ken ________________________________ From: David Lum [david....@nwea.org] Sent: Tuesday, 5 May 2009 11:26 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: Disabling NETBIOS Wouldn't \\machinename\c$ have to be \\FQDN\c$ to work if there is no NetBIOS? For me MACHINENAME = NetBIOS name, so perhaps my thinking is just wrong? (wouldn't be the first time...). "I'm not convinced that Microsoft has completely eliminated NetBIOS dependencies from their own stuff, let alone what third-party software houses do" +1 David Lum // SYSTEMS ENGINEER NORTHWEST EVALUATION ASSOCIATION (Desk) 971.222.1025 // (Cell) 503.267.9764 -----Original Message----- From: Ben Scott [mailto:mailvor...@gmail.com] Sent: Monday, May 04, 2009 7:17 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: Disabling NETBIOS On Mon, May 4, 2009 at 6:35 PM, Jeremy Anderson <jer...@mapiadmin.net<mailto:jer...@mapiadmin.net>> wrote: > I have investigated this a bit, and I just wondered if anyone had any > opinions they would like to share. Short version: Lots of things depend on NetBIOS. That including lots of things from Microsoft. Most notably, Exchange Server 2003 and earlier. You can disable NetBIOS if you don't use any of those things, but myself, I'm not convinced that Microsoft has completely eliminated NetBIOS dependencies from their own stuff, let alone what third-party software houses do. > I have no legacy clients (but a lot of Mac's and Linux Machines) server itself. > Currently I connect \\machinename\c$, will that change? That should still work the same. -- Ben ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~