The Steel Guitar Forum

It's a strange thing: I'm running an ethernet cable to a pc and a laptop, both running xp, one home and one professional, and it's like the computers recognize each other when they want to. More often than not I'm not able to get them to recognize each other (in viewing the "Workgroup Computers" screen), whereas I use to have no problem.

I've gone through the wizards several times with each, with the pc being the home computer. When I reboot they seem to see each other, but then within minutes they don't. I have plenty of ram in both, and large processors.

Does anybody have any advice on how I can consistently get these to recognize each other?

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<A HREF="http://www.authenticrecording.com" TARGET=_blank>www.authenticrecording.com</A>

XP's firewall, maybe? Did you install Service Pack 2, and that's when the problem began? Service Pack 2 has a much stronger firewall, that turns itself on from the start.

Just a thought.

Les

Hi Les,

I've disabled Norton's anti-virus, spam and firewall, but I didn't know xp had it's own. Do you know where I could disable that? I don't have Service Pack 2. Thanks,

Mark

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<A HREF="http://www.authenticrecording.com" TARGET=_blank>www.authenticrecording.com</A> <font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Mark Krutke on 03 May 2005 at 09:19 AM.]</p></FONT>

Start>Control Panel>Windows Firewall or
Start>Control Panel>Network Connections
Right click the connection you are using to connect the two computers, select properties in the menu, then select the 'Advanced' tab near the top. There will be a 'Settings...' button for the Firewall on that connection there.

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<font size=1>Site Admin</font>
<font size=0>Southern Illinois Steel Guitar Conference
<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Darren Harkins on 03 May 2005 at 01:29 PM.]</p></FONT><font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Darren Harkins on 03 May 2005 at 01:30 PM.]</p></FONT>

Make sure the computers are assigned to the same Workgroup and have different names. Right click on My Computer and select properties. Your Workgoup is probably already assigned to WORKGROUP, but if not, click on the Change button to name/rename your computer and Workgroup.

Mark:
The other advices that you recieved are good but there are also another couple of things you might want to try if their directions doesn't help. Have you used the wizard to make a floppy disk on your host computer and used that disk to set up your networking on the guest computer? Also, are you hooking up any different now than before, i.e. are you running through a hub versus running one line straight between the two computers. Have you tried changing your line in case you have a loose or broken wire in your cable? I don't remember exactly how the following works but I think if you are running one cable directly from computer to computer that the colored wires in the plug-in's are reversed. If you are running through a hub they are exactly the same in both plug-ins. [I may have this exactly backwards.]Hold them side by side with the plug-in part facing away from you to determine which type of wiring you have. Let us know if any of the advice works. There are a few more things that you can try.

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Winston,

I installed the disk per the directions at the end of the wizard, and now everything seems to work. Both come up in the "Workgroup Computers" screen and I can access the lap from my pc. For some reason I can even access the laptop with my firewall on (Norton Internet Security). It looks like I don't have to get a hub...yet. Thank you for the advice.

Darren,

I wasn't able to find the firewall options through that path you mentioned. Are you using xp? I'd like to know how to get at them.

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<A HREF="http://www.authenticrecording.com" TARGET=_blank>www.authenticrecording.com</A>

Mark,

After reading back through this today I saw you stated that you didn't have SP2. I believe the Firewall, pre-SP2, was either an on-or-off option. At least I don't remember a whole lot of flexibility in it. However, the option to turn it on or off should still be in the properties of the connection somewhere.

Try this link : http://www.uic.edu/depts/accc/lan/res-net/xpfirewall.html#sp1, it explains what I did above with screenshots of where to go. There are 2 examples on this page, SP1 is first, SP2 is second.

Hope this helps...

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<font size=1>Site Admin</font>
<font size=0>Southern Illinois Steel Guitar Conference
<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Darren Harkins on 04 May 2005 at 10:27 AM.]</p></FONT><font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Darren Harkins on 04 May 2005 at 10:28 AM.]</p></FONT>

Darren,

That helped alot, but I have a question for you. The reason I couldn't find the firewall setting was because I didn't look at my dial up modem icons. I was looking into the icons under "Network Bridge". Does the firewall need to be disabled even though I'm not using the Internet for my laptop, nor sending any information over the Internet from the desktop to the laptop?

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<A HREF="http://www.authenticrecording.com" TARGET=_blank>www.authenticrecording.com</A> <font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Mark Krutke on 04 May 2005 at 06:01 PM.]</p></FONT>

If you were able to resolve this problem, I would recommend leaving the Windows Firewall in its current state. It can be kind of finicky at times, but the extra layer of protection won't hurt.

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<font size=1>Site Admin</font>
<font size=0>Southern Illinois Steel Guitar Conference