I got a PC last week, which I loaded all my media onto so that it’s accessible to all my other computers (laptop, PS3, iphone). However, it’s not accessible. Here’s the setup:
I have AT&T U-Verse with a b/g wifi router.
My PC is connected via ethernet cable to the router. It’s running Windows 7 64-bit.
My laptop is connected via wifi. It’s running Windows 7 32-bit.
My PC says it’s connected to the “Network” network.
My laptop says it’s connected to the “2Wire277” network (my wifi name).
Is there a setting in the router system settings that I need to change to bridge these two networks? Is there a chunk of info y’all need that I’m forgetting?
Nope. That’s how I was trying to connect the computers in the first place. They’re on different networks, and need to be on the same network in order to create a homegroup.
Can they both access the internet through the router?
Connect both via ethernet and see if the computers can see each other. Try setting it up on that then going back to wireless.
Do you have the router manual? Theres an option to view your local network settings and what your network is currently set to, eg if the IP addresses are in the right range for both ie 192.168…
This generally isnt an easy thing to resolve over text. The defaults on the router should be allowing this, dont fiddle too quickly with them unless you have already in which case go back to defaults.
What are the IP addresses of each machine right now? What are the subnet masks?
Is 2Wire277 the wifi SSID for the device?
If it’s the SSID then you will never see that name show up on the wired machine.
The actual network name is an attribute of each machine’s network config and not the router. For example, an out-of-the-box XP install defaults to MSHOME for the network name.
Update: Before I gave up and went to bed, I managed to get the computers talking, just not able to be on the same homegroup. I enabled each’s sharing settings, which apparently I hadn’t done. I was then able to see the PC from my laptop, and logged onto it via my username. I was then able to point iTunes at the various media folders, and it repopulated my library. Mission (somewhat) accomplished. I have a feeling this wasn’t the most elegant of solutions…
Otara: They can both access the internet.
minor7flat5: I’ll check the IPs when I get home from work. 2Wire277 is the wifi network name, I’m not sure if it’s the SSID. Can they be different?
I’m pretty confident that your machines are all on the same network.
In short, there should be only one one device handing out IP addresses on your home network (barring fancier configurations). This means that, regardless of if your machines are connected to the single router wireless or via Ethernet, each machine should be handed an IP address in the same range.
In other words, one machine might get 192.168.1.8 and the other 192.168.1.9.
Since they are on the “192.168.1.x” network (and have the same 255.255.255.0 netmask) they are on the same subnet.
Your current networking problems are more likely due to the Microsoft networking on each machine and not the LAN networking.
ETA: You can ignore the SSID (the wifi name). That is almost certainly irrelevant in your networking situation.
You could be looking at a world of hurt by having two instances of iTunes managing the same media from different locations.
What should happen is that you set up iTunes on the system with all the media and enable media sharing (in iTunes). This allows the second copy of iTunes to play media from the first system via DAAP (Digital Audio Access Protocol). However, I suspect that you cannot copy media to a device (like an iPod/iTouch) using this method.
It’s doable, but you will certainly feel the pain of fighting the true iTunes way.
I used to keep my MP3 files on an external share and referenced it from two iTunes libraries. In my case, I made the MP3s read-only. This meant that the iTunes application maintained a local library containing metadata and links to the shared drive.
This was pretty good, with the caveat that I had to manually manipulate the MP3 files (e.g. setting album art and tweaking metadata). And iTunes gets cranky when you launch it without having the share connected.
The official Apple way of using media sharing in iTunes is not very pleasant because, at least when I tried it, you get a gigantic flat list of songs from the remote machine, with no fancy grouping or folders or anything.
No matter how you do it, you feel that you are fighting iTunes.
My current solution is to keep my MP3 collection in one golden copy on a shared drive, which I import to each machine in full. This gives each machine a standalone copy, while keeping one central golden copy.