NetBIOS Broadcasts

To facilitate the operation of NetBIOS-based applications on an IPX internetwork, NetBIOS over IPX provides standard NetBIOS services such as datagrams (single packets sent without acknowledgement such as broadcasts), sessions (multiple packets sent with acknowledgements between two endpoints) and name management (registering, querying, and releasing NetBIOS names).

For more information about NetBIOS, see "Introduction to TCP/IP" in the TCP/IP Core NetworkingGuide .

NetBIOS over IPX is implemented with two different packet structures:

NetBIOS Over IPX Broadcasts    Used to perform NetBIOS datagram and name management functions, such as Name Queries and Name Registrations. IPX routers might or might not forward NetBIOS over IPX broadcast packets.

NetBIOS Over IPX Sessions    Used to provide connection-oriented, reliable data transfers between two NetBIOS applications on an IPX internetwork. NetBIOS over IPX session traffic is unicast to a specific IPX internetwork address, rather than broadcasted. NetBIOS over IPX sessions are characterized by an IPX packet type of 0x04 (Normal IPX), and an IPX Source or Destination Socket of 0x455.

Because all NetBIOS over IPX session traffic is forwarded by IPX routers, the following sections discuss only NetBIOS over IPX broadcasts and how the Windows 2000 Router supports them.