My question, how can one revert W2k/XP to the less intensive "sensible" mode? Our network includes Win2k boxes and could do without superfluous traffic! Is this paving the way for Winnet cards like Winmodems?
-----Original Message----- From: David Bowles [mailto:dbowles@educationsupport.fsnet.co.uk]
Recently I read in one of the PC mags that by default Win2K and Win-XP both disable low-level Ethernet packet decoding / processing in hardware on the network card. MS have set this to be handled in software by the PC's CPU instead (sorry I can't remember which mag - PC-Pro, Pc-Plus or PCW - I'm moving house so I can't easily lay my hands on this mag right now).
There is a rather hysterical discussion of a similar / the same topic on Steve Gibson's website, so look down this page http://grc.com/default.htm for stuff on XP raw sockets. This implies that in XP, a clever programmer could easily strip data from the network card and access info promiscuously.
Now wait a minute ... hasn't Linux been able to do that for years :-) But as root.
-- Best wishes, Derek