Finder shows "iMac (2)" in sidebar

Hi - I've searched this forum but couldn't find a similar issue...

I noticed today that in the finder sidebar, below "Devices", by computer's name has changed from "Eamon's iMac" to "Eamon's iMac (2)"

Doesn't seem to have broken anything so far, and I was about to change the name back via System Preferences > Sharing > Computer Name, but before I did I just wondered if anyone has had this happen to them and/or has any idea what might have caused it?

It's almost as if the computer thinks there is another computer on our network called Eamon's iMac (there isn't).

Any ideas?

iMac 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
OS X 10.5.8

I've had it happen a couple of times. Never bothered me enough to find out why - just went and changed it back. If it took more than a few seconds to fix, that'd be another story.

Thanks bobtomay

Well, I've changed the name back and we'll see how it goes.

I like to know why these things happen, so I'll keep looking for an answer...

I believe it's tied to the DHCP addressing on your router. If you reboot your computer and it grabs a different address than it had before, the old address may not have cleared out of the address table yet, so, to distinguish itself from the other IP record still in the table, the Mac OS throws a number after the name, giving it a unique name to avoid any conflicts.