LAN W/ Windows Firewall

[Sir_Civik]

I have a couple of computers hooked up together on a router, all with xp
pro. Sharing folders and everything works fine. However when I turn on
windows firewall on one, that computer is no longer available on the network
to the others... to fix this I run network setup wizard and it shuts the
firewall off.

Any way I can have the windows firewall on and still be seen & accessable on
the lan?

 

[Cari \(MS MVP\)]

The firewall in SP1 is not designed for a LAN. However the firewall in SP2
is and works just beautifully for networked PCs.

Therefore you have two solutions here, either use SP1 and a third party
firewall software application or install SP2.

 

[Sir_Civik]

I've seen a lot of talk about issues with SP2, would SP2 be one of the
latest 'critical updates' to be installed?

under add remove i have
"Windows XP Hotfix (SP2) Q814995"
"Windows XP Hotfix (SP2) Q819696"

so if that's it I should be good to try the firewall again? or is there
more to SP2, theres no more updates I can install.