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Vista's Computer Browser Service

March 28th, 2007 · 5 Comments · 10,081 views
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ServicesThe Computer Browser service looks around your network to gather information on available workgroups or domains, computers and other networked equipment that supports the NetBIOS protocol. If you like to browse to shares or printers on other computers using the Network window (formerly Network Neighborhood), then you’ll want to keep this on automatic, otherwise, you can probably disable it. If your network consists of one computer connected to the internet, then you can safely disable this service with no loss of functionality.

Display Name:
Computer Browser
Service Name:
Browser
Process Name:
svchost.exe
Description:
Maintains an updated list of computers on the network and supplies this list to computers designated as browsers. If this service is stopped, this list will not be updated or maintained. If this service is disabled, any services that explicitly depend on it will fail to start.
Path to Executable:
%windir%\system32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs
Default Startup:
  • Home Basic: Automatic
  • Home Premium: Automatic
  • Business: Automatic
  • Enterprise: Automatic
  • Ultimate: Automatic
Log On As:
Local System Account
Desktop Interaction:
No
Depends On:
  • Server
    • Security Accounts Manager
      • Remote Procedure Call (RPC)
        • DCOM Server Process Launcher
  • Workstation
Required For:
None
Memory:
N/A
CPU:
N/A
Do you know something about this service that I don't? Please leave a comment below so I, and everyone else reading this, can benefit from your knowledge!

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Comments

  • tppk

    May 23, 2009 at 4:10 pm

    You need svchost.exe to maintain your operating system. If you terminate this process, your computer will shut down. There are ways to prevent it from being hack on the internet though. You can modify this in your firewall settings.

  • Pat Castle

    Jul 23, 2009 at 12:41 pm

    Computer Browser service is apparently killed by KB 971633 or 961371.
    These appear to be the only updates not recently installed on my only computer that still shows network shares. All my other computers (all are XP w/SP3) no longer list thenetwork shares.

    hmm. guess this isn’t the right place for this comment

  • iTropics.net

    Sep 11, 2009 at 6:01 am

    They said that if there is XP and Vista in the network and you are having an issue with XP that the shared folder keeps disconnecting (where Vista is the server), you have to stop “Computer Browser” and just leave it on to the main server.

  • Lauren

    Oct 13, 2009 at 4:17 pm

    You don’t kill svchost.exe you disable or stop the service through the services control panel icon. In Vista you can tell which services are running under which svchost.exe process by looking in the services tab in taskmanager and matching up the process ids.

  • Computer Geek

    Mar 7, 2010 at 7:01 am

    I have access to online computer geeks that run 24/7. If you dont get the help you need, try there. May well save you some time.

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