Home Network w/ XP Home & W2K Pro

I am trying to setup a home network using two PCs -- one with XP Home and one with W2K Pro. I am using a Netgear 4port Hub to handle networking. Both PCs are in the same Workgroup. Both show live on the hub AND in their respective network connections. In fact, the XP box can see the W2K box in it's Workgroup. I have shared out select folders and one printer, so that the other machine can use these resources.

The problem is that I cannot access folders nor the printer over the network.

I tried to run the XP Network Wizard to create a disk for W2K, but it won't work -- not compatible.

Any other ideas?

 

XP-home is only able to do 'Simple File Sharing' and 2K does not understand that sort of setup.

It sounds like you are mostly there and only need to tweak a couple of things. What specific Netgear device do you have? Makes a huge difference if it is really a router/switch as opposed to a hub.

Also, have you manually assigned IP addresses or do you have it done automatically by something? If so, what?

 

Here is my setup.

If they can talk at all, I'd be happy with sharing a printer and a folder or two.

Netgear 4 Port 10Base T Ethernet Hub (EN 104 TP)

It's definitely a hub.

Here are the ipconfig /all files:

Windows 2000 IP Configuration
Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : amd2800
Primary DNS Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcast
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : VIA Rhine II Fast Ethernet Adapter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-0E-A6-71-45-FC
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 169.254.230.200
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.0.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . :
PPP adapter InterStar:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-53-45-00-00-00
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.xxx.xxx
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Disabled


Windows IP Configuration
Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : hp742n-cj
Primary DNS Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : NVIDIA nForce MCP Networking Adapter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-10-DC-3B-D2-9D
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 169.254.230.201
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.0.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :

Any ideas what I can do from here?

 

Yup. Ideas.

First a thing that will speed up your network once you get the devices talking (and with a slow hub plus the fact that the world's best hub is fairly stupid when compared to a switch) is to manually set the IP addresses and subnet mask on the PCs.

As it is, they both have to search thru over 32,000 IP addresses to figure out there are only two of them.

Set the subnet mask to 255.255.255.0 and use IP addresses of 192.168.0.x where they are different only at x and that is some number between 1 and 254 so, for instance, 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.0.2.

But that is only a suggestion since they will work the way they are with the automatic private addresses being assigned unless you have really bad luck at boot time one day and both try to use the same address.

Now for the meat of the matter. 2K demands to know who wants to connect as does XP (home and pro). In a peer workgroup network, that means that both PCs must be logging on with a username and non-blank password.

My suggestion is that you either use the exact same login on both PCs or that you use different ones and put a copy of both accounts (exact match since the password is case sensitive and it's better if the usernames are identical as well) on both PCs.

That should take care of basic connection between the two. If you have a need to fine-tune the security you can do that. It will be lots easier to get exact security settings on the 2K PC though than on the XP-home system since home isn't designed to do other than fairly basic security.

Last note - I strongly suggest you get a router/switch and relegate the hub to duty as a paperweight. The switch will allow the PCs to pass data at well over 10 times as fast as the hub can plus the router will allow connection to a broadband modem and will take care of automatically setting up IP values on both PCs. If you are still on dial-up you can simply make use of the switch portion and ignore the router.

A good device will run you under $50.

 

I will 2nd, 3rd & 4th that suggestion.

I fixed in one hour ( using a Router/Switch ) what had been bugging me for days.

BillyBob

 

Headed to Office Depot...

I'm heading to OD tonight. They have a switch that will cost around $10.00 (after rebates). I'll try your suggestions this weekend and let you know the outcome by Monday. THANKS!

 

You really need to make sure you get a device that is a combo of router and switch. Otherwise, with a pure switch you will still be stuck with ICS.

 

Small point. On a small "quiet" network, a hub can out perform a switch. I've been caught out by this in the past: going into a network and advising replacing hubs with switches to improve performance, only to find there is no improvement - or even a slow down!

Hubs effectively just pass electrical signals. So as soon as a hud starts receiving the electrical signal comprising a network packet, it can start transmitting it out to the rest of the network.

A switch on the other hand, analyses the electrical signal and makes a descision on where to send it based on information within the signal (MAC addresses). That takes time. Depending on the switch and how it is set up, that means that a switch will only start transmitting once it has received at least part of the signal and made a decision where to send it.

However, defining small and quiet is difficult without analysing the traffic. Once the traffic increases, switches really come into their own. The removal of collision domains and full duplex operation make a big impact.

However, were I to stick my neck out, I'd say on a home network you wouldn't see any performance advantage in a switch over a hub, unless you invite all your mates round (with their PCs) and start playing traffic noisy network games.

Perhaps an academic point nowadays as it get harder to find hubs!

Oh and if you only have two computers THE fastest connection between the two is a crossover cable directly between them! You can run full duplex (communicate in both directions at the same time) with no other network device in the way having to relay the signals

A router is the ONLY sensible way to connect a network to the internet - matched with a good firewall (personal firewalls on small home networks acceptible - hardware firewall for businesses) IMHO.

For the more technical of you, I believe "quiet" in this context would be less that 5% collisions.

 

Interesting observation ReggieB. Hadn't thought about hub vs. switch in those exact terms.

 

One thing that I have found since using a Router/switch is that I DO NOT have to be involved with any MANUAL IP addressing. The Router/Switch does it ALL. ( or at least has anyway )

I have 3 machines and a Printer plugged in to the Router. Usually this ( my ) machine is be 192.168.1.100. I just looked and it is 192.168.1.101. We had a power outage during the night. So by it being 192.168.1.101 it says that my Wifes' machine was turned on first.

I just turned the Printer on and I see it is 192.168.1.102.

And the NICEST thing I like about the way I am set up is NOBODY depends on anybody else for anything. If I decided to mess around and kill my machine ( and believe me I have ) the others ( and the printer ) can still carry on.

BillyBob

 

:: Update ::

Went to OD and bought a D-LINK DI-604 router/switch. Unfortunately, it gave me the VERY same problems. The XP box could see the W2K box, but not vice versa. Shares had already been created, but I created a brand new shared folder on each PC in hopes that would help. Reset the WORKGROUP name and even added DNS & gateway addresses to both PCs. They talked (according to the switch/router link lights), but would not communicate with each other.

I started searching the Net for specific problems between XP Home & W2K. One of the forums had a post that suggested a firewall causing trouble.
Hmmm... so I turned off the firewall on the XP box. Voila! The XP box could see and communicate with the W2K box. Turned off the firewall on the W2K box and it now sees the XP box.

Reconfigured Norton firewall to allow some traffic -- just enough for the PCs to communicate and share resources.

Original problem solved. ​

=========================================================
Now, to get some advice on the BEST settings for my firewall -- the DI-604 firewall -and/or- Norton's firewall. Newt, should I start another thread for that question?

 

CharlieJ - first off, great to hear you got things going.

And yes, a new thread since it's a totally different topic.

 

I am a great fan of DHCP (the tool/protocol suite that provides the automatic and dynamic IP addressing). In a wondows 9x network it was wonderful the way you could change network settings (like altering the default gateway router's IP address) without having to reboot all the computers (instead just renewing the lease in WINIPCFG).

Even in NT/2k/XP networks the ability to change network settings for the whole network is a godsend when configuring or changing a network. We have a backup ISDN connection to the internet and I can switch all the PC over to using that (should our main link fail) by simply altering the DHCP setting and runing IPCONFIG /RENEW on the PCs.

With good old NT4 the DHCP service was splendid. Not only IP information but things like WINS settings could be handed out. That's one thing most router DHCP services cannot do. Also PCs would appear in the DHCP service application long before they would appear in Network Neighbour, which made it a good application for centrally checking that PC were coming on line correctly in a new network.

I think the Windows 2000 DHCP has been made overly complicated by the dynamic connectivity with DNS. Fortunately, I don't have to play with it though - thank you Mr Novell.