Home Network Problems

[Noel S Pamfree]

I recently set up two machines as a home network and they worked fine, I
could access the hard disk of each machine from the other and email and surf
on the client machine using the host's Internet connection. This was with
Black Ice Defender running as a firewall.

After two or three days problems arose and the machines seemed to decide on
what seemed to be a random basis as to whether or not they would see each
other. In the end I specified the host at 192.168.0.1 (Sub mask
255.255.255.0) and the client as 192.168.0.2 (same sub mask). This enabled
me to 'see' each machine from the other and to retrieve files from on hard
disk to the other.

The client machine however continues to give lots of problems; it always
'sees' the host (the icon appears in the system tray) and I can usually
access it's hard disk. However the shared Internet connection chooses at
random whether or not it will appear in 'My Network Connections'. When it
does I cannot use it even though I can see it and I get error messages if I
try to check my email or surf the net.

I have tried setting the default gateway to 192.168.0.1 but it seems to make
matters worse. I have also tried taking out all these connections and going
back to let the DHCP sort it out but this makes matters worse.

They both use Windows XP and there is no problem with the host machine.

Any help will be appreciated.

Noel

P.S. Even if I disable Black Ice Defender it makes no difference!

 

[Mei Chan [MSFT]]

Can you elaborate a bit more on your network setup?

(1) Do you have these machines connected through a HUB?
(2) Are these machines using Internet Connection Sharing?
(3) You mention the shared Internet connection chooses at randon whether or
not to appear in the "Network Connection", can you elaborate? Is this the
Internet Gateway Device you are looking at?

 

[Noel S Pamfree]

Thanks for your reply.

(1) The two machines are connected by a cable (cross-over) there is no hub
(2) Both machines have the ICS service marked as 'started' and DHCP is
'started'
(3) The icon for the shared Internet connection sometimes appears in 'My
Network Places'

In checking this information I notice that when I look at the Local Area
Connection Status, Support tab the dialogue box says the Address type is
'Automatic Private Address' and I think it should say 'Assigned by DHCP'


Noel