problems with computer browser service

We are currently attempting to isolate network performance issues on a
Windows 2003 Domain with 50 users and 6 servers. Single subnet, domain and
DNS server. All workstations have been deployed and I noticed that the
computer browser service is active on all workstations as well as servers.

I have heard that this service can degrade network performance. Does anyone
know how it could degrade the network performance and by how much (ie - how
much overhead can it add - hard numbers would be nice but not expected :-))?

Should i disable the service or set it to manual for all the workstations?
It appears from reading MS literature that I will need to have the service
running on at least 3 machines on the subnet for people to be able to
successfully browse the subnet.

I wouldn't expect to see much change even if you disabled browsing
completely in a network like that. Setting up WINS and making all machines
WINS clients would do more to limit broadcast traffic than fiddling with the
browser service.

Since you have six servers you could safely disable the computer browser
service on all the workstations. If any of your servers is multihomed or
running as a remote access server I would disable the browser service on
them as well. As long as you have the PDC emulator (the Domain Master
Browser) and at least one other backup browser it should work fine with
60-odd machines all on the same segment.

eahunter46 wrote:
> We are currently attempting to isolate network performance issues on a
> Windows 2003 Domain with 50 users and 6 servers. Single subnet,
> domain and DNS server. All workstations have been deployed and I
> noticed that the computer browser service is active on all
> workstations as well as servers.
>
> I have heard that this service can degrade network performance. Does
> anyone know how it could degrade the network performance and by how
> much (ie - how much overhead can it add - hard numbers would be nice
> but not expected :-))?
>
> Should i disable the service or set it to manual for all the
> workstations? It appears from reading MS literature that I will need
> to have the service running on at least 3 machines on the subnet for
> people to be able to successfully browse the subnet.

If it ain't broke don't fix it.

You were misinformed that the browser servers causes excessive network
traffic. Actually it causes very little especially in a single subnet.

If you really want to optimize your bandwidth don't allow peer to peer
sharing from pcs. Now that produces broadcast traffic advertizing the shares.