IP Scanner is a network tool that can detect the network devices inside your private LAN based on the TCP/IP protocols.
The package has two applications: IP Broadcaster and IP Scanner. IP Broadcast is a free tool and IP Scanner is shareware but you can use it within small networks (up to 5 other computers) for free.
IP Broadcaster is an application that sits in the menu bar. It provides WAN and LAN information for multiple network interfaces. This application can broadcast data to the sister application, IP Scanner, which collects all data from all the IP Broadcaster-enabled machines.
IP Scanner is the application that shows all the running devices in your LAN after a complete network scan. It can detect the IP address, the
MAC address and the type of the devices or the operating systems.
Both IP Scanner and IP Broadcaster uses the
Bonjour technology. The implementation of this technology is quite poor. For example it can't detect machines that are running applications that have implemented Bonjour/Rendezvous technology.
Pluses: it is free for very small networks, it detects all the running machines inside your network pretty fast, it has implemented a search engine that can filter the returned results by name or by IP class.
Drawbacks / flaws: it doesn't have the full support for the Bonjour technology.
In conclusion: the application can do its job pretty well, even though the Bonjour support is not perfect.
version reviewed: 1.7
