Computer networking question... part wireless, part wired

Factual Questions
1

I’m afraid that I’m fairly new at setting up a home network, and I seem to be having some trouble.

I have an older computer and a computer that I just bought. The older computer is hooked up (via an Ethernet cable) to a Linksys wireless router. My brand-new computer (which I just bought) is sitting in the basement connected via a USB wireless device.

The router and wireless device work (I’m posting from the new computer now), but I can’t seem to access the files on the other machine. I’ve been having a devil of a time trying to figure how to get the two computers to “see” each other.

Can anyone help me set this up so that each machine can access the files of the other one?

Both machines are running XP Pro with SP2. The older machine has an internal Ethernet card, the newer one is using a Linksys USB 802.11g connection.

Zev Steinhardt

2

Did you enable file and print sharing on each system and do you have any folders shared?

3

Yes to both.

However, when I try to access the other machine, it doesn’t work.

Zev Steinhardt

4

I’m at the point where when I go to “My Network Places” and view the workgroup computers, the other machine is there. But when I try to access it, I get an error message:

So, how do I give myself permission?

Zev Steinhardt

5

OK, I have part of it working.

I figured out that the problem was the firewall on the old computer. Once I added the IP address of the new computer to Zone Alarm’s Trusted Zone, all was good - I can now access files in the shared directory on the old computer with the new machine.

So, I figured, I would now do the process in reverse. I added the old computer’s address to the Trusted Zone on the new computer. However, with the old computer, it’s a bit diferrent. When I go to “My Network Places” and drill down to the workgroup name, I can’t even access the workgroup, let alone search for the new computer. It says that I don’t have permission for that - but I am an administrator on the machine.

Anyone have any guesses?

Zev Steinhardt

6

A workaround that works on my current network is instead of drilling down through Network Neighborhood, just try mapping a drive to
ewmachine\c$ (substitute whatever the new machine’s name is, of course).

I have several generations of PC’s, some of which swear on stacks of bibles that the others aren’t there… but they have no problem sending to a printer attached to a machine they can’t see…

7

Thanks, Ethilrist, but I tried mapping the drive too, but that didn’t work.

Actually, I found out that with MacAfee, not only do you have to have the IP in a trusted zone, you also have to allow the event. Having done that, I can now access the share on the old computer.

Now, on to finding out how to print to the printer (Epson Stylus Photo 820) across the network.

Zev Steinhardt