WinXP Pro networking question

[dstrubhar]

I have a couple copies of WinXP Pro running on my network. They can ping other machines on the network, they can use the shared internet connection, they can get their IP addresses from the DHCP server. BUT I can't seem to find shares that are available from any other machine, and I can't seem to get it to even *find* another computer. What am I missing?

[muno]

net use z: \\<ip address of sharing computer>\<sharename> (/user:<computername of sharing computer>\<privileged username>)

what does that tell you?

[vass0922]

are they all on the same workgroup?

[dstrubhar]

Yes, they are all on the same workgroup. I did get them to connect by doing a "search for computer" and using the IP address of the target. Then I could navigate to my desired folder and file.

muno, I am new at some of your terminology--do I type your whole string from the command prompt?

[muno]

Hello.

Of course you have to substitute everything inside the brackets with correct stuff.

Eg. if I wanted to connect to a shared drive on my server from my laptop, I would type the following

net use z: \\169.254.0.1\hd2 /user:server\administrator

it would then prompt for password.

Or, similarly, you can just map the drive from explorer; tools->map network drive
fill in the blanks and all's ready.

[gibblewabble]

A simple question???????

have you run the network wizard? and are you using passwords on your machines, xp doesnt like to network without passwords.

[muno]

Oh yeah! Remember to disable simple file sharing

In explorer, tools->folder options->?advanced?->the bottom option, take the tick out of the select box of simple file sharing

[gibblewabble]

ya xp's simple file sharing is stupid, one of the poorer choices for networking. sometimes microsoft takes 3 steps back for every two forward.

[dstrubhar]

No, I have not yet done troubleshooting (but I will today), partly because I suspect my problem is related to my lack of coherent understanding of the parameters of my mixed environment as described below.

I am running a mixed (non-domain, at this point) network of mostly Win2000Pro and some Win98 and a little WinXP Pro, with a Win2000Server as an application server and a central file sharing server. The interactions between all these are interesting at times, and when I try to decipher the various documentations, it isn't always clear how they are supposed to interact. NetBIOS is disabled, and I don't want to enable it.

I will return for further comments after I try some of your suggestions today! Thanks for them all!!

[DVNT1]

Re-enabling NetBIOS will really help it to work as expected.

Computers that are running an operating system prior to Windows 2000 will be unable to browse, locate, or create file and print share connections to a Windows 2000 computer with NetBIOS disabled.