[SOLVED] Help needed with file and printer sharing

[KBalint14]

Hello everyone. I'm hoping someone could help me. I'm trying to share a printer and a specific folder on my desktop (main) computer so I can access them wirelessly via my laptop. I've already "Set up a wireless network" and "Set up a home or small office network." Here are the problems I'm having:

I made sure that sharing is enabled on the printer attached to the main computer. Even so, I cannot find this printer when I browse for it on my laptop computer.

As for the folder I want to share: I right clicked on said folder (on my main computer) and enabled sharing, but I have no idea where to begin as far as how to access the folder on my laptop computer. When I try to access the main computer, I get a message saying "computer is not accessible. You might not have permission to use this network resource." Is this the correct way to access a shared folder?

I apologize for the lengthy post. For the longest time, I've wanted to create a network between my 2 computers, but I always run into these problems and I don't know how to fix them.

Many thanks for your help!!

[Go The Power]

Hello and welcome to TSF
Have you created a workgroup?
If so are both computers on the same workgroup?

[KBalint14]

Yes. When I ran the "Set up a home or small office network", it asked me for a name for my workgroup (I don't know if it's relevant, but the name I used for my workgroup is "MSHOME14" (all I did is add some numbers after the default "MSHOME")).

[Go The Power]

Ok that is good. The work group is made. Are both computers on the same work group?

Open My computer
> On the left side bar click on View system information
>>Click on the tab Computer name
>>>Under Workgroup do both computers say MSHOME14

[KBalint14]

I just checked both computers. They are both in workgroup "MSHOME14."

[johnwill]

Turn off any firewalls for debugging. If the firewall is the problem, you'll have to configure it to allow access to "trusted zone" addresses. Note that some firewalls must be completely uninstalled to stop them from affecting your networking.

PING each computer by IP address, and if successful, PING by name. You can obtain the IP address of a computer by opening a command prompt (DOS window) and typing IPCONFIG. This should work for any Windows version. A failure here needs to be corrected before you go any farther.

Check your Services are Started on all PCs: Workstation, DHCP Client, Server, TCP/IP Netbios helper, Computer Browser.

All computers should be in the same workgroup for computer browsing to function properly. File & Print Sharing has to be enabled on any computer you wish to share files or printers from. You also need to actually share the resource in question from My Computer, right click on the drive/printer/folder, and select sharing.

If you encounter difficulties accessing computers that are visible in Network Neighborhood, make sure the computer being accessed has an account with the same name/password as the system connecting to it uses to login.

While the default NetBIOS setting is correct for normal network configurations, it's possible for it to be altered, and it costs nothing to make sure it's correct. NETBIOS over TCP/IP must be enabled for normal network browsing.

[KBalint14]

Hi! Sorry it's taken me so long to reply. My wife gave birth to our son on 6/18/07, so as I'm sure you can guess, things have been busy!

So, as it turned out, it was Norton Firewall that was causing all the problems. Everything is working well now!

Thanks for all your help!

[johnwill]

Glad you got it working.