Windows Sharing Problem

[Photo-John]

Someone help me before I stomp my computer. I have a network with a router and three computers. In the last week or so I have developed some network problems where I periodically cannot access shared folders. Today I completely lost the ability to get into one of them. When I check on the actual machine the read only box is checked for that directory. I uncheck it, click the "apply" button, and then click ok. I immediately take a look at the properties and the read only box has rechecked itself. I want to kill this computer. I need to move images from it to the office network and I can't.

Someone help me before I do something drastic.

I completely and absolutely hate computers.

[DEvianT]

Intermittent loss of connecivity can be missmatches between the speed and duplex settings of the PC's. Tie them all down to 100 Full Duplex.

[DEvianT]

Don't worry about read only folders as long as the files inside aren't also read only.

[SmartWombat]

Someone help me before I stomp my computer.
Someone help me before I do something drastic.
I completely and absolutely hate computers.

I would hate Microsoft's software, the computers are fine

>> When I check on the actual machine the read only box is checked for that directory.
There is a microsoft bug, it's all over our XP networks in the office.
The read-only box isn't properly ticked, it just has a green blob in it.
As you can see in the attachment - this has no effect on access to the folder.


Now this network has been working just fine in the past, yes?

So what have you done to it since you last had it working?
? Unplugged a laptop and plugged it in again
- suspect cable to the laptop (or socket in the laptop, mine is damaged)

If you haven't installed any new software, or moved any hardware, then we're in the twilight zone ( cue music doo dee doo doo ... )

Maybe you have a dodgy cable/plug and it's an act of vacuum cleaner moving the wires about that's caused problems.
I have a job to do on my HAN (House Area Network) where some of the connnectors were fine for 100Mb not 1Gb and I need to remake the cable ends.

Maybe your router is dying. My wireless router/print server/hub was getting flaky. Replaced the DLink 54G with a new Cisco MiMo and not only is the wireless running at 300Kb (yes 3x faster than cables!) but also the wired router part of the box is more reliable and doesn't need to be rebooted every day.

[masdog]

Have you restarted one or both of the computers? Odd, but I've found that you occasionally have to restart a server or two for no good reason.

Anyway, I have seen stuff like this before. For me, it usually happened when adding individual users to shared folders on NT4 (a huge pain in the ass, if you ask me).

1st - Do you have other shared folders on this computer? If so, can you open them?
2nd - Can you access this one shared folder from any other computer?

This will help us determine where the problem is at. It could be in the router, it could be the "server," or it could be the machine trying to access the data.

If it is the machine hosting the shared folder, check to make sure the folder is still shared and the persmissions are set properly. Right click on the folder, select "Sharing and Security." Make sure that you have given yourself the proper access to the folder.

Finally, if none of that helps, reboot the computer. I've found that rebooting can usually take care of my file-sharing issues.

[jorgemonkey]

When in doubt, what I do at work is I'll see if Comp A could see any other computers. If it could, I'd goto B and see if it could see the other computers, and so on. Usually here its been only one computer.

The other thing I've done is turn off all the computers & routers, & everything else. Turn the router back on, let it do its warmup, and then turn the comps on one by one.

Also if you have any firewalls on any computer, turn them off and then see if you can see any other comps. I've had times where a firewall was blocking an incoming connection, so I couldn't see Comp B from A, but I could see A from B.

[DEvianT]

and not only is the wireless running at 300Kb (yes 3x faster than cables!)

Ermm no it isn't your confusing units. Specifically Kilobytes with megabits. It's way slower than a 100BaseTx full duplex wired connection. That said it won't help with PJ's problem going into the semantics of that.

Right quick checklist:

1/. Are all computers in a workgroup or domain if in a workgroup is it the same one?
2/. At each computer open a command prompt and type ipconfig then hit return.
3/. Jot down the ip address and subnet mask for each computer. I'd expect something like 192.168.1.x for each computer and a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0
4/. If they are not all on the same subnet mask make all PC's the same.
5/. Client for windows networks and File and Printer sharing for windows networks and Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) should be ticked in the general box for each network interface card.
6/. All network cards and each port of the switch/router should be tied down to the same link speed and duplex (usually 100 Base TX and Full duplex)

Once this is checked check TCP/IP comms by typing this on a PC at command prompt:

ping {ip address of another machine}

This should respond rapidly and without error. intermittent error would indicate cable problem or link/duplex mismatches.

Then type

ping -a {another pc name}

The name of the PC should resolve into an address and the ping should be successful. If it isn't it would indicate a problem with name resolution.

Let me know what you find and I'll think of more stuff to check.

Also are you using software firewalls on the PC's?

[readingr]

John,

I have this situation with one file on my PC and found out that it was a file locked by an application that crashed. I copied the file and then deleted the old version and it all worked ok when I renamed it back to its original. But that was on a local drive.

With XP I have found an instance where I could only share a folder if all the users had the same password regardless of the Policy setting or security applied to the folder. My final cure was to backup the folder. Copy it to a new folder; delete the old folder and then replaced it with the copied folder and it was happy again. Never did get to the bottom of what went wrong.

Hope you don't loose too much sleep over this.

Roger

[masdog]

John,

Did you get your sharing problem resolved?