Xp PC accessed ok but cannot access others

[1234seng]

5 PCs with winXP connected via hub/switch. All seems ok except this one
at address 192.168.1.51 cannot browse the net to find the others. can't
ping them either - but it can ping the modem/router at 192.168.1.1 AND
just one at 192.168.1.44 and also by name. I even mapped it as network
drive and accessed it but of course no browsing to it is possible.
I checked the list of services " browser, DHCP, DNS etc.." they are all
started.
Looking forward to your answer
thanks

[johnwill]

Boot in Safe Mode with Networking and see if it changes the symptoms.

[1234seng]

Thank you for your suggestion. In fact I got it to work by looking in all other posts on this site from which it seemed it could be related to xp's firewall. Each PC must be ping-able.
->Advanced then ICMP hatch on allow entrant echo request. I'm not where the LAN is
so I may forget something else that I did to get it ok.
In the meantime I fell on another problem : how to take control via internet of a connected
PC which accepts it. A few did so on my PC but I don't know which software they used.
Regards

[johnwill]

Try UltraVNC for remote control of most any version of Windows.

[1234seng]

Thank you for suggesting me UVNC. I was however wondering if the
built-in MS "offer assistance" could work for me so I do not have to
load the PC with still more software. I tried to open port 3389 and
set exception for remotes in windows-firewall (using winXp Pro)
But so far no sucess.

[johnwill]

Well, it does, but I've always had more luck with UltraVNC, so that's what I normally use. For XP-Pro, you can use Remote Desktop, but both parties can't interact.

[1234seng]

Thank you. I tried to resd more about "offer remote assistance" and it seemed that it was
meant to work only inside a corporate network which I take to mean a LAN but not via Internet, in which case it is no good for me. Do you know if that is so ?

[johnwill]

That's not true, at least according to Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/300546

[1234seng]

Thank you. I think I found the answer to my queries about remote assistance. It is
under "Configuring Remote Assistance with NAT connections" here

http://www.petri.co.il/what's_remote_assistanc.htm

Maybe this is not the place to give this information. Where should I post it so others on your site might profit ?

[johnwill]

Here is good, it'll be found if someone searches on this issue.

[1234seng]

Ok, Thank you. I'll try to round it up a bit here then. It turns out that this microsoft product is practically useless because in the real world most PCs are behind a non-Upnp-NAT. Most
'novices' that one wants to help are not at ease editing the rcBuddy.MsRcIncident file and
doing port-forwarding etc. It IS possible to work around it but it is just SO CLUMSY what MS
did.

[johnwill]

Well, you have to realize that the NAT layer issue isn't a Microsoft creation, it's the standard way to utilize multiple computers from a single public IP address. It's the nature of the beast. :smile

[1234seng]

Yes that is what I am trying to convey : Microsoft decided NOT to adapt its product to this
standard way of connecting one or more PCs to the internet, so they brought out a product
which is basically useless !

[johnwill]

Microsoft had nothing to do with the development of NAT. What product did Microsoft bring out that's "non-standard"? Any other O/S behind a NAT layer has exactly the same issues as Windows.

[1234seng]

Seems there is a misunderstanding - the product I'm talking about is not the shell os
called "windows xp" but the one called "remote assistance" I will now move on to the
next product called "remote desktop" to see wheather I can get that one to work.

[johnwill]

Well, Remote Assistance has to live by the same rules as any other networking application when behind a NAT layer, again, this is not Microsoft's doing.

I don't mind bashing Microsoft at all when they deserve it, in this case, they don't.