I'm the volunteer sys admin for a rural computer co-op consisting of 4
identical WinXP Home machines networked via an ethernet switch. The machine
designated as the server connects to two printers and accesses the 'net
through a dial-up.
The co-op is unsupervised. People come whenever, power stuff up, turn it off
and leave whenever. Previously I have had the system working so that all
anyone has to do is power up the server and log on as a guest. It's
configured - or was - to dial up automatically, and ICS is set up such that
users could log onto any of the other machines as guests and share the
connection, as well as the printers and shared software folders on each
machine.
Because keeping four machines updated on a shared dial-up is a virtual
impossibility, I periodically bring the machines home where I have a
satellite connection, do all the updates, and then return and reinstall the
machines.
Since the last time I did this (which included updating all machines from
SP2 to SP3), I have everything working as before with the significant
exception that the guest account on the server has no access to the dial-up
connection. Unless that machine is logged on through the administrator
account there's no internet access for anyone.
Obviously I'm no expert - I'm just the most computer-savvy guy they could
lay their mitts on. From what I've read in the searches I've done, I really
wonder how I *ever* had this working. But I did, for a couple of years. Dumb
luck I guess.
BTW I've used "net user guest" at the command line to confirm that the guest
account on the server is set up for network access. When I open the network
connections cpl, it's as though there are no connections available to the
guest at all, much less anything I can fiddle from there.
Deep appreciation in advance for any help you can provide.
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