Roving User

Name challenge traffic occurs when a user stops the computer and then moves and starts the computer on a different subnet with another primary WINS server.

Typically, the name registration request is answered with a Wait for Acknowledgment message (100 bytes), and the new WINS server, assuming the active entry was replicated, challenges the IP address that is currently in its database for this name (Name Query packet, 92 bytes).

When there is no reply, as can be expected in this case, the WINS server repeats the challenge two more times and then updates the name registration entry with the new IP address and a new version ID. The new version ID indicates that the entry must be replicated from its new "owning" WINS server to other WINS servers on the network.