Windows 7 serving to XP computers

[1sikbITCH]

I have recently updated 2 computers in my house to Windows 7. When I did so, I had several hard drives already installed on them. Every drive that was already installed when I loaded Windows 7 can be seen and accessed from the XP machines with no problems.

The problem is this: I just bought another hard drive and put it on one of the Win7 machines. Of course it shares fine with the other Win7 machine. The XP machines can see this drive, but cannot access it no matter what settings I change:

I have spent 2 evenings now searching every site I can find and have searched these forums and followed all the instructions I could find in Jack MDS' post that he pastes every time that someone has a problem like this, but cannot find the answer.

I have changed it to a Work network, added extra permissions, reformatted the drive as both active and not active, and even tried putting it in the public folder.

I have compared the new drive settings to the other drives that share just fine, and the settings are absolutely identical. The shares are the same type, the volumes are the same types, the permissions are all seemingly the same. I just cannot figure out what is different.

I don't want to have to reinstall Windows every time I add a new drive, and the older machines won't handle Windows 7. I can't afford to upgrade every machine in the house much less buy more Win7 licenses.

Any ideas will be much appreciated.

 

[spidey07]

It's a permission/ownership problem. What account are you logging into XP with? Add that account with the same username/password to the win7 machines and add it to the sharing and permission properties of the serving machine.

 

[JackMDS]

Win 7

When configured on peer-to-peer Network.Win 7 has three types of Sharing configurations.

Home Network = Works only between Win 7 computers. This type of configuration makes it very easy to Entry Level Users to start Network sharing.

Work Network = Basically similar to the previous methods of sharing that let you control what, how, and to whom folders would be shared with.

Public Sharing = Public Network (like Internet cafe) to reduce security risks.

The Work Network is the one that most of us are going (and need) to use.

Win 7 Work Network's Sharing settings are in principle similar to Vista's configuration (some menu in locations in Win 7 might be in different place, and look a little different, but it should not be a problem for a compute to adopt)

So, maybe this can Help.

Make sure that the Software Firewall on each computer allows free local traffic. If you use 3rd party Firewall On, Vista/XP Native Firewall should be Off, and the active Firewall has to adjusted to your Network IP numbers on what is some time called the Trusted Zone (consult your 3rd Party Firewall instructions.

General example, http://www.ezlan.net/faq#trusted
Win -7
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/...mputers-running-different-versions-of-Windows

Win7 Work Network with a little visual help), ,http://www.onecomputerguy.com/windows7/windows7_sharing.htm

Vista File and Printer Sharing- http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727037.aspx

Windows XP File Sharing - http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;304040

Printer Sharing XP - http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/networking/expert/honeycutt_july2.mspx

Windows Native Firewall setting for Sharing XP - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875357

Windows XP patch for Sharing with Vista (Not need for XP-SP3) - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922120

When finished with the setting of the system it is advisable to Reboot all the hardware including Router and all computers involved.



😎

 

[1sikbITCH]

I have the Win7 settings checked to allow sharing without passwords, but for some reason adding the password to the account worked.

These computers are strictly media players (no surfing or anything) and it's just myself and my wife here, so I don't really want them to require a password, but if that's what it takes it's better than no sharing at all. Thanks!

Thanks!

Question for Jack:

As I posted in this thread, I have already read your post above having seen it numerous times as the response to all the other threads that mention sharing problems. It does not address this particular situation so I am hoping for some more insight from you (or anyone else here of course) if you have learned the answer to this yet. Specifically, why do the drives that were already there when Win7 was installed share just fine on the XP computers, but newly added drives with the exact same permissions and configuration are not accessible without a password? Thanks again for your thoughts.