Resolved Windows 7 PC cannot see XP files

My daughter just got a new laptop with Windows 7. I wanted to set it up in a wireless network with her old laptop running XP. I reset the router since we did not know the administrator password, then used the old computer to setup the router over an ethernet cable. I disabled encryption and changed the channel from 6 to 11. I disconnected the cable and was able to access the Internet from both computers and share files between them.

Then I connected the cable from the new laptop to the router, enabled WPA-PSK encryption and created a key. I was pleased that I could still access the internet and share files (although it took the Win 7 PC a long time to find the other one). Then I realized that the cable was still connected so I was not using the wireless connection from the new computer.

When I disconnected the cable from the new computer, the other computer disappeared from the network. I could still access the Internet from each computer, and open folders on the Win 7 computer from the XP, but the XP computer could not be found from the Win 7.

I am sorry this is so long, but I want to be clear about what works and what doesn't. After reading some other threads here I will try (1) disable the Windowss Firewall, (2) make sure file and print sharing is enabled on both, (3) set to channel 11 everywhere, (4) be sure the correct key is entered everywhere. I will also try WEP encryption to see if that works.

My question is, does this sound reasonable and is there anything in Windows 7 that I am missing? This is my first experience with it. (It will be a few days before I can get to my daughter's to work on it again.)

Thanks for any ideas.

 

I finally did get back to my daughter's and carefully set up everything again without encryption. It work, so I went back to WPA encryption and it still worked. I don't know what I did wrong the last time, but this time I paid close attention to the details and made sure the same passcode was used at each end. Thanks for your encouragement.