Office Network Help

[Omniscient]

I'm setting up a small office network that consists of 4 laptops connected wirelessly, 1 desktop connected directly to the wireless modem and 1 network printer connected directly to the modem.

Everything seems to be working fine. I can get all 5 computers online and the network is setup up properly, however one of the laptops refuses to cooperate by getting on the network.

When I view the computers on my network from any of the connected PCs it displays all the other computers except the one laptop. I've repeated the configuration a few times without any success.

I'm curious if there's a fundamental issue with my modem or something. The ISP provided us with 5 usable IPs and we have 6 machines, but as I understand things this really shouldn't be an issue. The computers should be able to share the connection, correct? They all can get online, and external IPs shouldn't effect the internal network.

Do wireless modems/routers have a limited number of computers which they can support? IF there were a limit why would it be able to get online but not able to reside on the network?

[Quartz]

If you're using the ISP's IP addresses, the fact that you have 5 and need 6 is an issue. You need 1 for the printer, 1 for the desktop, and 4 for the laptops.

If you're using internal IP addresses (10.a.b.c or 192.168.x.y) then the number of the ISP's addresses you actually use should be 1.

[Omniscient]

I'm not sure how the ISP's tech configured the modem/router. I thought that might be an issue and I will investigate when I'm back on site but I'm a little confused as to why I'd be able to access the internet from all the PCs but not see them all on the internal network if that's the case.

I had assumed that if one PC was short an available IP it wouldn't be able to do anything.

[yoyodyne]

Assuming Windows XP, is the laptop's network connection firewall turned on? If so, try turning it off. Is File and Printer Sharing also turned on? Is anything actually shared? How are user accounts set up on the machines? Do the accounts have passwords?

[Omniscient]

The firewall is not the issue. File sharing is turned on. I used the exact same procedure to set up all the laptops and this is the only one which isn't cooperating. The only real difference is that this PC had been part of another network before and had a variety of users created on it. I've deleted most of those users.

It insists on booting to a the login prompt instead of booting up directly, a small inconvenience but might be a notable difference in configuration. I uninstalled Netware client services in order to allow fast user switching.

I'm tempted to restore the PC to it's factory settings in order to configure it from scratch if it looks to be a configuration issue instead of a more general network setting/hardware problem.

[yoyodyne]

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but it's in the same workgroup right?

[yoyodyne]

Re the login: by booting up directly do you mean going straight into Windows (auto logon) or going to Welcome Screen?

Control Panel --> User Accounts --> Change the way users log on or off -->
Use the Welcome Screen checkbox will reenable the Welcome Screen.

Start --> Run --> control userpasswords2 will allow you to turn off logging in and specifying what account/password to use for auto logon.

[Fear Itself]

Are you using any Norton products on the laptop? Norton software often steps on Windows networking, rendering it inoperable. Remove it from all computers.

[PuddingCat]

Originally Posted by Omniscient

I'm setting up a small office network that consists of 4 laptops connected wirelessly, 1 desktop connected directly to the wireless modem and 1 network printer connected directly to the modem.

In this case you should be using one of your ISPs IP addresses, on the Internet side of the modem. Internally you should be using DHCP from the modem which will be serving a private internal range.

Originally Posted by Omniscient

When I view the computers on my network from any of the connected PCs it displays all the other computers except the one laptop. I've repeated the configuration a few times without any success.

This suggests that the Windows Browser service hasn't picked up the laptop. Have they all been turned on for a while? It doesn't indicate any problem with the modem though.

Originally Posted by Omniscient

I'm curious if there's a fundamental issue with my modem or something. The ISP provided us with 5 usable IPs and we have 6 machines, but as I understand things this really shouldn't be an issue. The computers should be able to share the connection, correct? They all can get online, and external IPs shouldn't effect the internal network.

Correct. This doesn't seem to be related to the modem at all.

Originally Posted by Omniscient

Do wireless modems/routers have a limited number of computers which they can support? IF there were a limit why would it be able to get online but not able to reside on the network?

In some cases there is a limit, but it's rather dull. For home gear, the limit is normally 250-ish devices. There is no way you're hitting this.

To troubleshoot this, I'd suggest you check connectivity.

On one of the working PCs, open a command prompt (Start->Run->cmd.exe) and type ipconfig. You will get output similar (hopefully) to this.

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : ultrax.int
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.108
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.1

Now do the same on another working machine. By now, you have 2 IP addresses, IP1 and IP2.

Repeat the same on the laptop. The laptop IP should be similar.

e.g.
IP1 is 192.168.0.1,
IP2 is 192.168.0.3,

and hopefully the laptop (IP3) is 192.168.0.<something>.

Assuming you get a sensible address for IP3, go back to the first machine and type ping <ip3>

Then post back here tell me what happens.

If you want to take this to email, so we can just post the resolution then email me a trmatthe@spam.gmail.spam.com

thanks,
Tim