Did a windows update break my network?

[PepperBreath]

Very recently I've been having trouble with my home network. Keep in mind that it's been working very literally for years. When it goes down, it's almost always do to a program I installed on my desktop and I usually find a way around the problem or simply uninstall the program.

Recently though my network just up and died on me. Aside from a few games here and there, I haven't installed anything that would bother my home network. I mainly use my network to connect my laptop to some shares on my desktop but my Xbox is also capable of connecting to these shares. For troubleshooting, this is pretty helpful because it allows me to find out if it's my laptop or the desktop that's being a pain.

When my network died though, I was able to connect to my desktop once, just once, with my xbox. Without changing anything, today I tried to connect with my xbox and now it along with my laptop can not connect.

I've uninstalled my antivirus on both laptop and desktop and disabled the firewall on both. No dice. Without the firewall or antivirus, my xbox can't connect to either my desktop or laptop.

I can't tell you how strange this is. It's as if printer and file sharing has been completely blocked. I can ping my desktop from my laptop but I can't connect to the shares. Very frustrating.

Anyone have any other suggestions? I tried the troubleshooting advice at ezlan.net but it was all for not. Thankfully my network was more of a convenience thing and not something I really needed. Still, it'd be nice if I could get it back up.

 

[Hyperlite]

what is your hardware setup like? any hardware firewalls of any sort? did you double check file sharing options on all the systems to see if they were somehow reset, either by windows update or something else?

 

[PepperBreath]

My desktop is wired to my WRT54G Router. My laptop is wireless to the WRT54G. My Xbox is connected to a Buffalo wireless router which is in bridged mode with the WRT54G.

Basically file sharing options on both the desktop and laptop were enabled, firewall disabled on both, and anti-virus software was completely uninstalled on both when I was really getting frustrated. At the best, my laptop could detect the desktop on the workgroup but could not browse the shares. It said that the desktop was denying access.

This has only sprung up in the last two weeks though. No significant changes have been made to my network which as worked for years. Also noteworthy, the laptop can not connect wirelessly or when I wire it to the WRT54G. What I haven't tried, and will probably try when I get home, is connecting the desktop and laptop directly via a cross-over cable and see if that'll work. At this point, I'm simply trying to narrow down the possibilities although I'm completely mystified why it would just "break" for no reason which is why I tend to blame a Windows Update more than anything else.

 

[Hyperlite]

And i don't think you're wrong to point the finger at WU, its been known to screw things up before.

 

[nweaver]

can you connect via UNC paths? UNC paths with IP's?

 

[PepperBreath]

Originally posted by: nweaver
can you connect via UNC paths? UNC paths with IP's?

Eh? Explain.

 

[nweaver]

\\computername\sharename or \\ip\sharename

 

[PepperBreath]

Originally posted by: nweaver
\\computername\sharename or \\ip\sharename

No dice.

Even more interesting. I tried accessing the shares from the Desktop. It couldn't even find its own shares using either Network Places or UNC path. Hmmm...

They are listed in Computer Management under Shares though. They are being shared but for whatever reason it's being blocked somehow, even from the desktop itself.

 

[PepperBreath]

I found out the cause!

I checked the Task Manager and started shutting down services one by one, starting with the ones I knew were non-essential and testing the shares. Eventually I got to wmiprvse.exe and right after shutting it off, I could see the shares from my laptop.

I checked on google and it's associated with Windows Management Instrumentation, a part of the OS. So why did this OS component go bad? (Windows Update I'd reckon). Do I need it and if so, how can I make it play nice with my network?

I scanned it with Avast! using the latest definitions. It's legit and not a virus or Trojan apparently.

**Update**

Did some searching on google. HP drivers for AIO printers seem to cause this to constantly run in the background which for some reason blocks network shares. I uninstalled the HP drivers (harder than you think!) and it looks like things are back to normal more or less.

After I uninstalled the HP drivers, wmiprvse.exe still runs in the background preventing access to network shares right after a fresh boot up. After a short while though, it disappears from the list of services running and I can access the shares. Very strange. Glad I figured it out though.

 

[Matt1970]

I have a had the latest Windows Update barf a couple machines here. One it goofed up so good we had to completely re-install everything.

 

[sieistganzfett]

sounds like you can either set that service to manual or disable instead of 'automatic' to correct your problem or you can try to see if sfc will fix it

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/docu...roddocs/en-us/system_file_checker.mspx

 

[John]

I can't begin to tell you how many issues I have had within the last couple of months where my customer has an HP printer and their system is flaky. In some cases when you access msconfig to make changes you receive "An Access Denied eror was returned while attemtping to change a service, You may need to log on using an administrator account to make specific changes." A lot of the issues seem to hover around the HP PML driver.

 

[PepperBreath]

I couldn't believe how "spyware" like those HP drivers were. I uninstalled them with add/remove programs and everything seemed to go fine but when I checked "Program Files" the HP directory was still there and there was a HP directory in Common Files as well. Both were relatively full of stuff even after the install.

Deleting those two directories and uninstalling didn't even get rid of that HP service after a reboot!. I had to go to my windows/system32 directory and delete all the installed HP files in there too in order to stop it from loading on boot up.

I honestly have never seen a legit program act like that.

They were newer drivers from the HP website that I had installed a few months before. I was too lazy to dig up the CD that came with the printer and I assumed that the drivers from the web would lack all the additional crap that's usually installed from the CD. I was wrong and it turns out those updated drivers were worse. I've had the printer for a while and the old drivers from the CD didn't give me network problems.

Coincidentally, nothing "broke" until I connected to the printer via my laptop to print. That's when I started having problems and couldn't see the network shares. I had had those drivers installed for a while and the printer worked and shares worked but it wasn't until the laptop remotely connected to the printer that bad stuff happened. That's why I never ever imagined it could be the HP drivers or printer.