Can find Vista box, can't share folders or printers.

[Slap_Shot_12]

I bought a new Vista desktop to replace an old xp machine and now I cannot
get my Vista laptop to connect. When I click 'Network' on the laptop the
desktop machine is listed, but when I double click it or try 'explore', after
a minute or two I get a message that says "Error message 0x80070035 - The
network path was not found".

When I try installing printers it times out without finding any.

I've disabled Norton and Windows firewall entirely to make sure that's not
the problem. The network is set to 'private' on both, they are both in the
same workgroup and I've got the following network settings:
Network discovery - on
file sharing - on
public folder sharing - on
printer sharing - on
password protected sharing - off
media sharing - on

I've spent hours trying to find a solution so any advice would be
immeasurably appreciated.

 

[Malke]

I bought a new Vista desktop to replace an old xp machine and now I cannot
get my Vista laptop to connect. When I click 'Network' on the laptop the
desktop machine is listed, but when I double click it or try 'explore',
after a minute or two I get a message that says "Error message 0x80070035
- The network path was not found".

When I try installing printers it times out without finding any.

I've disabled Norton and Windows firewall entirely to make sure that's not
the problem. The network is set to 'private' on both, they are both in the
same workgroup and I've got the following network settings:
Network discovery - on
file sharing - on
public folder sharing - on
printer sharing - on
password protected sharing - off
media sharing - on

Turn the password protected sharing ON and create user accounts AND
passwords that match the ones on the other computers. Don't disable
firewalls, configure them properly. See below for general network
troubleshooting:

Excellent, thorough, yet easy to understand article about File/Printer
Sharing in Vista. Includes details about sharing printers as well as files
and folders:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727037.aspx

For XP, start by running the Network Setup Wizard on all machines (see
caveat in Item A below).

Problems sharing files between computers on a network are generally caused
by 1) a misconfigured firewall or overlooked firewall (including a stateful
firewall in a VPN); or 2) inadvertently running two firewalls such as the
built-in Windows Firewall and a third-party firewall; and/or 3) not having
identical user accounts and passwords on all Workgroup machines; 4) trying
to create shares where the operating system does not permit it.

A. Configure firewalls on all machines to allow the Local Area Network (LAN)
traffic as trusted. With Windows Firewall, this means allowing File/Printer
Sharing on the Exceptions tab. Normally running the Network Setup Wizard on
XP will take care of this for those machines.The only "gotcha" is that this
will turn on the XPSP2 Windows Firewall. If you aren't running a
third-party firewall or have an antivirus with "Internet Worm
Protection" (like Norton 2006/07) which acts as a firewall, then you're
fine. With third-party firewalls, I usually configure the LAN allowance
with an IP range. Ex. would be 192.168.1.0-192.168.1.254. Obviously you
would substitute your correct subnet. Do not run more than one firewall. DO
NOT TURN OFF FIREWALLS; CONFIGURE THEM CORRECTLY.

B. For ease of organization, put all computers in the same Workgroup. This
is done from the System applet in Control Panel, Computer Name tab.

C. Create matching user accounts and passwords on all machines. You do not
need to be logged into the same account on all machines and the passwords
assigned to each user account can be different; the accounts/passwords just
need to exist and match on all machines. DO NOT NEGLECT TO CREATE
PASSWORDS, EVEN IF ONLY SIMPLE ONES. If you wish a machine to boot directly
to the Desktop (into one particular user's account) for convenience, you
can do this. The instructions at this link work for both XP and Vista:

Configure Windows to Automatically Login (MVP Ramesh) -
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/Autologon.htm

D. If one or more of the computers is XP Pro or Media Center, turn off
Simple File Sharing (Folder Options>View tab).

E. Create shares as desired. XP Home does not permit sharing of users' home
directories or Program Files, but you can share folders inside those
directories. A better choice is to simply use the Shared Documents folder.
See the first link above for details about Vista sharing.

F. After you have file sharing working (and have tested this by exchanging a
file between all machines), if you want to share a printer connected
locally to one of your computers, share it out from that machine. Then go
to the printer mftr.'s website and download the latest drivers for the
correct operating system(s). Install them on the target machine(s). The
printer should be seen during the installation routine. If it is not,
install the drivers and then use the Add Printer Wizard. In some instances,
certain printers need to be installed as Local printers but that is outside
of this response.

Malke

 

[Slap_Shot_12]

First off, that was tremendously helpful - and some excellent information in
general on this topic. Thanks a million!!

I had the firewalls turned off temporarily to ensure that wasn't the
problem, and I've since turned them back on and created the new user
accounts, and I'm having no problem with sharing files anymore.

I do have a problem with shared printers, though. When I go to install a
shared printer on the laptop, it shows the two that are attached to the
desktop. When I try install or connect to them, however, the response is
INCREDIBLY slow. Once they are installed (and I am eventually able to print a
test page), the response time is so slow that MS Office applications time
out before they are able to print.

Since you did such a great job with my first issue, I thought I'd turn back
to you to see if you can help with this too!!

 

[Malke]

First off, that was tremendously helpful - and some excellent information
in general on this topic. Thanks a million!!

I had the firewalls turned off temporarily to ensure that wasn't the
problem, and I've since turned them back on and created the new user
accounts, and I'm having no problem with sharing files anymore.

I do have a problem with shared printers, though. When I go to install a
shared printer on the laptop, it shows the two that are attached to the
desktop. When I try install or connect to them, however, the response is
INCREDIBLY slow. Once they are installed (and I am eventually able to
print a
test page), the response time is so slow that MS Office applications time
out before they are able to print.

Glad you got your network ironed out. As for the slow network printing, I
have a few suggestions:

1. Did you install the correct drivers for the printers on your Vista
machine? If not, that's your next step. Get them from the printer mftr.'s
website.

2. Since I don't really have any information about your printers, I don't
know what's applicable to you so do a Google search using "Vista slow
network printing" as your search term. This will bring you quite a few
links.

3. Post in the Vista printing newsgroup and don't forget to include all
pertinent information - printer models, how they are installed (locally to
a computer running what operating system), directly to the network via
ethernet, etc. The newsgroup is:
microsoft.public.windows.vista.print_fax_scan

Malke

 

[Slap_Shot_12]

The suggestions earlier in this thread fixed the problems I was having, but
only temporarily. I now find that when I startup the desktop the network
works perfectly and I can access shared files easily. After about 20 minutes
of half an hour, however, the computers can no longer communicate. Restarting
the laptop does nothing, but restarting the desktop will fix the issue (I
thought some wireless network card power savings might be the issue).

Any suggestions on what might cause this and how to fix it?