Specified network name is no longer available

[Gord Graham]

I have three machines identically configured with XP SP2 connected
over through USB wireless adapters to a D-Link 714-P+ wireless router.
They are configured to use simple file sharing. I just went
wireless...before everything was connected by cable and worked just
fine. Now...

Each machine can see the others and each machine can see each other's
shared folders.

If you try to open share on another computer that only has a few files
in it, it open just fine, but if the share has a lot of files or
subfolders in it, it "thinks" for about 3 minutes and comes back with
"Specified network name no longer exists".

Also, if you try to copy a file from one machine to another you get
the same error. The file doesn't even start to copy, from what I can
tell.

Everything regarding the internet connection works just fine.

I have tried all the usually things you see recommended in the
newsgroups: checking network config, resetting tcpip stack, resetting
master controller and server services, resetting router, rebooting a
million times, etc., and I have gone through every windows networking
troubleshooting guide I can find.

Somehow I think it has something to do with the wireless
configuration, which I know nothing about. I doubt that it is a bad
adapter, because the problem happens on any machine talking to any
other machine.

Does anyone have any ideas, or some diagnostic I can run that will
actually tell me what the problem is?

And does anyone know what "Specified network is no longer available"
means, and what kind of problem it indicates?

Many thanks.

....gord

 

[Doug Sherman [MVP]]

I have a XP machine that behaves this way. Even though the LAN NIC was not
connected, network performance with the wireless NIC improved dramatically
when I disabled the LAN adapter in Device Manager - don't know why.

Also, sometimes there is a significant performance difference depending on
whether you use the adapter's connection software vs. XP's native wireless
connection.

Doug Sherman
MCSE Win2k/NT4.0, MCSA, MCP+I, MVP

 

[Gordon Graham]

Good suggestions. The network cards are disabled, and I have tried using the
Windows Wireless Zero Configuration service rather than the software that
came with my wireless adapters, and still no go.

You would think the error message would mean something, but maybe that's
hoping too much!

....gord

 

[Richard G. Harper]

As often as not I have found that this message means, "Hey, I was connected
to this network share; but something interrupted the connection, and now I
can't connect to it any longer!"

Unfortunately I don't have any tips other than finding out why the network
connection is interrupted and stop that from happening. Sorry. ;-(

--
Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] (e-mail address removed)
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