HP CIFS Server and Terminal Server User Manual

Page 7

Chapter 3

Samba with TS on Windows
NT4/2000/2003

Terminal Server on Windows NT4, 2000, and 2003 is configurable to allow the underlying
Windows operating system to appropriately handle multiple incoming client connections for
Samba (or other) servers. It is configurable via the

MultipleUsersOnConnection

registry

parameter on the Terminal Server NT4 OS platform, the

EnableMultipleUsers

parameter on

the Terminal Server Windows 2000 platform, and the

MultiUserEnabled

parameter on the

Terminal Server Windows 2003 OS platform. For Windows 2000, as of August 2004, the

EnableMultipleUsers

parameter is only accessible after installing the Microsoft Hotfix from

Q818528. For Windows 2003, as of February 2006, the

MultiUserEnabled

parameter is only

accessible after installing the Microsoft Hotfix from Q913835 (included in ServicePack1).

MultipleUsersOnConnection is described in the Microsoft Q article Q190162, “Terminal Server and
the 2048 Open File Limitation.” As implied in the title, the registry parameter was actually
created to address a limitation on the number of file handles that a Terminal Server session could
utilize, but the end result was the establishment of unique virtual circuits (TCP/IP connections)
for individual client connections. This behavior provided exactly the functionality that Terminal
Server clients required to efficiently mount Samba file server services, and resulted in widespread
usage in the Terminal Server user community for this specific purpose.

With the NT4 registry parameter

MultipleUsersOnConnection

, or the Windows 2000

EnableMultipleUsers

set to 1 (enabled), or the Windows 2003

MultiUserEnabled

set to 1

(enabled), the Samba server acknowledges a discrete TCP/IP connection request for each unique
Terminal Server client, and therefore starts a new smbd user process to service each client. This

Samba File Servers

Windows Clients

NT4.0/2000/2003 Terminal Server

TCP Virtual Circuit per client

Storage Array

smbd

UNIX process
per client