Hello:

I have small issue that has been puzzling me and I wonder if someone has any thoughts on it.

We have two iMacs at home - my iMac and my wife's iMac - both running Snow Leopard and networked together by Ethernet using an Airport Extreme router.

When both computers are on, and I open Finder and look at the Shared portion of the sidebar, here is what I see...

On my iMac, it shows my wife's computer name, as one would would expect. No problem there.

On my wife's Imac, it shows the name of my computer twice - once with the first letters in uppercase and once with the first letter in lowercase - as seen in the screen capture image attached  (see attachment 1). You can also notice that the first listing is "ejectable", the second is not.

When I right-click on the first one, it shows it as a Mac server as one would expect (see attachment 2). When I right click on the second one, it shows it as a PC server (see attachment 3). (In both cases, when I access the listing, the same accounts on the computer are shown).

Does anyone know what this means and why it happens? I have tried dragging the PC version listing to the trash (it cannot be removed). To further complicate things, we just recently acquired a MacBook Air and when all three computers are on, the MacBook Air shows what my computer does (ie, it accurately displays only 1 copy of my computer name).

Thanks for any thoughts you have.

Those are indeed PC shares. This is usually one of two things - you have installed a virtual PC, i.e. Parallels,Fusion, Virtual Box, and, even if you're not using it anymore, the networking components from the Virtual PC are still active - or - you have file sharing turned on with the option of SMB (Server Message Block) services enabled in the "options" under Sharing in System Preferences.

Ringing any bells?

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

Quote from: HarmanyHank on January 12, 2012, 02:39:20 PM
On my wife's Imac, it shows the name of my computer twice - once with the first letters in uppercase and once with the first letter in lowercase - as seen in the screen capture image attached  (see attachment 1).

I am sure that Dan is correct (he usually is!). If you look at the computer names, they are NOT the same at all. One has an apostrophe and space while the other has a dash - so the system is "seeing" two different machines.

Stop, please, enough already. My head is swelling twice its normal size.

Seriously though, those are just wild swings at the ball, it may be something else, and then I would be ... shudder ... wrong!

Anybody know where to get a propellor-topped beanie size 16?

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

Well, kudos to the Dan with the swelled head. SMB file sharing was indeed turned on (on both computers, interestingly enough). I turned it off, rebooted both computers and, voilà, the double-listing on my wife's computer disappeared.

I'll be happy Mac'ing into the sunset!

Thanks very much,
HarmanyHank

But I spoke too soon!  This morning when I turned on both computers the double listing on my wife's computer was back again.  And, no, SMB file sharing had not somehow gotten turned on again. (I have never installed any form of virtual PC on either computer).

However, up until about three years ago, my wife's iMac with the double-listing was home networked to a PC (the PC was eventually replaced by my iMac). Could there be some remnant somewhere of the networking with the PC (the PC is not used anymore and is off-line)?  Or is there some setting in the Airport Extreme router that could be causing this?

Thanks again for any advice.
HarmanyHank

Well, my head-swelling has reduced to normal size, as it appears I was only half-right!

It is indeed the SMB filesharing that is causing the remnant, rebel PC shares to show up again. It may be another user account still has SMB activated? Or, as you mentioned, sometimes it takes a while for the share's info to be dropped from various caches - either the Macs or the routers. It wouldn't be the old PC that set up anything on your Mac, so I think you can safely assume that's not it. You would have to log in to the other accouts, assuming you have any, and check their SMB fileshare settings.

Other than that, I can't think of anything else, which is good, as I can go back to wearing my size 8 propellor-topped beanie!

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

Hi, Dan:

Thank you for thinking about this.  I've looked at all accounts on both computers and everywhere SMB file sharing is unchecked.

One curiosity I just discovered (it's probably why I thought I had resolved the problem last evening and then not this morning).

When I bring my computer out of sleep and open Finder followed by bringing my wife's computer (the one with the problem) out of sleep and opening her Finder, the double listing shows up in her Finder (both Hank's iMac and the PC version hank's-imac).

When I do the reverse (bring hers out of sleep first followed by mine) then her Finder only shows the correct listing for my computer (ie, Hank's iMac).

This must explain something but I haven't got the foggiest idea what.

Thanks again.