Windows Vista Can't Connect to Any Network Shares from Vista Home Premium Laptop

sirdoris

New Member
Hi,
I have a Dell Core2Duo laptop with Vista Home Premium 64 with SP2. It's connected to my network wirelessly however I've tried it wired too but that made no difference.

On the network are a number of devices; 2 windows 7 Home Premium 64 machines and a brand new netgear ReadyNas Duo, all wired to the same router.

All PC's and the Nas are on the same workgroup.
All the PC's can see each other (and the NAS) if you click 'Network' from the start menu.
All PC's have file and printer sharing enabled, and the two Win7 machines are running a homegroup too.

However the laptop times out and returns the following error if you click on any of the other PCs/Nas.

Error 0x80070035
The Network Path was not found

Trying to connect to the laptop from any of the other PC's returns the same error message.

I have tried using the same logon accounts an both the laptop and Win 7 PCs. The Nas has no user accounts or passwords and is accessable from all other network devices.

I've tried turning off all software firewalls (Windows Firewall) on both computers attempting to connect, and I've tried a wired connection to the same router.

I can ping ALL devices from the laptop, and the PCs can ping the laptop back via IP address.
The PC's and Laptop can ping each other via host name, but only the Win 7 machines can ping the NAS by hostname.

Both the Win7 PCs and laptop can produce correct 'Network Maps' from the 'Network and Sharing Centre'.

All PC's and the laptop have 'Network Descovery Mode', 'Printer and File Sharing' and 'Public Folder Sharing' ENABLED.

There is no Norton or Macafee running, only AVAST free, Although the laptop did have a Macafee trial when new, which has been removed and I can't see any sign of it's services running.

Hope someone can help this is driving me insane :(

EDIT:

Just to add all PC's, including the laptop have internet access.
 
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and the two Win7 machines are running a homegroup too.

There's your problem... You cannot use Win7's Home Networking with mixed operating systems on your network.
Click on where it says "Home Network" and select "Work Network"... Then go into the advanced settings and enable "username/password sharing" and "network discovery"...
 
Thanks for the reply.

The Win 7 machines also have normal shares too (or at least I thought they did).

So do I have to disable homeworking on the Win7 PC's?

Will the Win7 homeworking also prevent the laptop from connecting to the NAS?

Are your instructions above for the laptop or the Win7 machines?

Thanks
 
Thanks for the reply.
The Win 7 machines also have normal shares too (or at least I thought they did).
So do I have to disable homeworking on the Win7 PC's?
Will the Win7 homeworking also prevent the laptop from connecting to the NAS?
Are your instructions above for the laptop or the Win7 machines?
Thanks

I can't answer to why the Vista laptop is having connection problems. There are many possible causes. The best I can suggest is that you check settings in that machine and try to get it working with the Win7 machines shut down. I've not seen a case where Win7 has caused network errors shutting down other machines... but I've heard tell of it. So I would deem that a "reasonable suspicion" at this point.

To switch from Home Network to a networking scheme compatible with Vista and NAS boxes you need to set your Win7 machine to "Work Network". You can do this in the Network and Sharing dialog by clicking right on the word "Home", this should produce a dialog that will let you select a Work Network.

In the Network and Sharing dialog click on advanced. Enable Network Discovery and Usernam/Password sharing... This produces an XP-like networking scenario that most other OSs will understand.

From there you should also turn off public folder sharing (dumbest idea Microsoft ever had) on a network wide basis and set up your own file shares on a folder by folder basis.

I see you have everything on the same workgroup. You should also make sure all accounts on all machines are passworded (there are autologon tools to get you past that on boot if you wish). All folders shares should be read only as a starting point.

From there there are literally hundreds of tweaks and improvements... disabling ipv6 is a good start, there are changes you can make to your services etc. to "soup it up"... but for now lets just get it working "at all".
 
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Ok, update time. I've tried connecting to the NAS without any other devices on appart from the laptop and NAS. When I try and connect to a share, i.e: \\NAS-b8-28-73\media I now get an 'unspecifed error 0x80004005' ...however if I use the IP, i.e: \\192.168.1.100\media it works. Not that that makes a huge difference to me as the whole thing using a DCMH server in the router so I can't map any drives without hostname connectivity. I've reverted the network to public, etc. and setup user accounts for the NAS the same as the windows logons. but that has failed to get me any closer. Any ideas?
 
Further Update: From my previous post I figured it was a DNS problem, comparing the settings of IPCONFIG/ALL between all my PC's the only difference was the ModeType (Peer to Peer for the laptop and Hybrid for all the others). Using the following MS support page I figured out how to change it: Windows Vista-based client computers do not use the node type that you specify for name resolution on the DHCP server and now all my shares are visable and work :) Thanks CT for pointing me in the right direction.
 
Ok... couple of things...

You need to be on a WORK network... This is crucial as "public" networks do not support file sharing and "home" networks only work between windows7 machines...

Second, don't map drives... create shares. It's both more organized and faster. Mapped drives were Win3.1 networking and are supported only for special circumstancess these days. Which shares you make will depend on how you organize your NAS folders... On mine I have 4 users so my shares are (false names, of course) \\BigBox\Spud \\BigBox\Darlin \\BigBox\Son \\BigBox\Niece these are private areas where the only access is for the named user. As well we have open, read only, shares for \\BigBox\Movies, \\BigBox\Music and \\BigBox\Pictures... all of these are visible in the Network browser.

One thing I would strongly suggest is that you rename the NAS... and perhaps your computers as well... Have some fun with it... The names on my network are all themed after electronics... Volts, Amps, Watts, Joules... A friend of mine is using Cheese, Crackers, Chips... Any name up to 15 characters should be acceptable. This is largely organization but if you are using DHCP the NAS IP address could change and you do need access by name.

Also you should double check the settings in the NAS box... make absolutely sure you are set up to be compatible with windows XP networking (as opposed to MAC or UNIX). Then get the vista machine and the NAS talking... Once you have that working, we can join the Win7 machines in and all should be good.
 
Further Update: From my previous post I figured it was a DNS problem, comparing the settings of IPCONFIG/ALL between all my PC's the only difference was the ModeType (Peer to Peer for the laptop and Hybrid for all the others). Using the following MS support page I figured out how to change it: Windows Vista-based client computers do not use the node type that you specify for name resolution on the DHCP server and now all my shares are visable and work :) Thanks CT for pointing me in the right direction.
 
Further Update:

From my previous post I figured it was a DNS problem, comparing the settings of IPCONFIG/ALL between all my PC's the only difference was the ModeType (Peer to Peer for the laptop and Hybrid for all the others).

Using the following MS support page I figured out how to change it:

Windows Vista-based client computers do not use the node type that you specify for name resolution on the DHCP server

and now all my shares are visable and work :)

Thanks CT for pointing me in the right direction.
 
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