How to change NetBIOS name on macOS Mojave?

I need to change the NetBIOS Name under "System Preferences" -> "Network" -> "Advanced..." -> "WINS"; but I can click Ok, Apply or whatever; the OS will completely ignore my entry and keep the previous (default?) name.

Why the UI is broken? Why can't I set a different NetBIOS name from there? And how can I set it then?

UPDATE:

The UI doesn't show the change and will restore the previous value all the time I come back. But if I just change the value, "Apply" and close the window, then after a while the value I inserted will be taken in account and will be shown correctly. There's no logic in this, but just try to save the value, close, and come back in 3/5 minutes (rather than immediately) to check if now the change is there. It worked for me.

However, trying to trigger the name change I also touched the other fields and added a WINS server with IP "1.2.3.4". That had the same problem. But now also that one has been saved, together with the name and, no matter how much I try to delete that entry and wait for the change, that non-existent IP is always restored and I am no more able to have the "WINS Servers" list empty.

Does anybody has any suggestion? The UI carries this "completely broken" feeling and I dunno if I am incurring in a bug, if I am missing something, or if at Apple are lazy and sloppy on power-user features 🙁

Solution 1:

I had the same problem and I could not change NetBIOS name even after I changed it in Sharing > Computer Name and rebooting. But after I turned Wi-Fi off and on again NetBIOS name changed according to Sharing > Computer Name.

UPD: Above things did not help for long time. After I turned Wi-Fi on NetBIOS name returned to an old value after some minutes. But it seems I've found my root cause. My Mac has static IP in router's DHCP settings. The record in the table had Hostname which was my old NetBIOS name. It seems macOS was capturing this name from network. So, I just removed the record from the table and added it again with an empty Hostname. Now router does not tell my Mac what name it should take and the name is taken from local NetBIOS settings.

Solution 2:

In regards to the settings being applied and saved within System Preferences, I do know that there is a bug in the UI where if you do not make your changes then completely close out (⌘ + Q) of System Preferences the change will not be reflected. It seems that System Preferences tends to cached the previous value until it is closed and relaunched.

Solution 3:

Do you use file sharing, if so, you will either need to turn it off prior to changing the netbios name, or, alternatively, go into system prefs, file sharing and change the computer name there. This should then change the netbios name once applied. Hope this helps

Solution 4:

By first turning off the network in System Preferences > Network (i.e. turn off wifi) and then changing the NetBios I was able to make the change permanent.

Turning the network back on, my NetBios was now showing the new value.