XP -> 2K networking help needed

[buckmacuk]

Hi there. I think I must be having some kind of 'senior moment' or somesuch here.

Problem is this: I have a home network with two desktops (both 2K) and two laptops (one 2K one XP-SP2). The desktops are linked by wire to a Netgear router and out to broadband. The laptops use wifi through an access point on the main router.

The problem lies with the XP laptop. I can access the internet and I can see the other machines in the workgroup. This system has a password associated with the user - the others don't. I've set up a user on both desktop systems to mirror that of the XP laptop user complete with password. However, if I try and browse either of them from the laptop it requires a signin. Surely that never used to happen - I always thought the credentials were passed automagically?

Anyway, if I remove the password from the laptop, I can browse the others and use shared resources instantly with no login required - it only happens when XP is password protected.

What am I missing here?? (this is where I think I might be having the 'senior moment' and missing something really obvious :-(

TIA for any/all help folks. Chris B

 

[buckmacuk]

Something which may be related - since this used to work! The XP laptop shows a bunch of Microsoft updates applied very recently - could it be one of those that's changed things?

Any ideas anyone - please - before I beat my brains out on this

Cheers, Chris B

 

[ktwebb]

XP isn't really password protected, resources on that machine within XP are however. Drives, volumes, files (if your partitioned NTFS). XP Home or Pro? I would start over, setup and account on the XP machine that matches an indentical account on the 2K machine. For ease sake, I'd put that account into the local admin group on the 2K machine. So say for instance the user account you create is user1 and the password is password. The User1 account is added to the Administrators group on the 2K machine. Now you'll need to create that account on the XP machine. I'd also add that to the local admin group for ease of use here. Login to the XP machine with that User1/password account. Now simply use the UNC path and administrative share symbol to get to an administrative share on the 2K machine. Start, click Run then typ: \\win2kcomputername\C$ obviously win2kcomputername will be the name of that computer. If you have problems then you can use the IP and take NetBIOS resolution out of the equation. That will work if you've setup the account correctly. I can't tell you what has happened because I don't know what you've done thus far but that is a quick primer on peer to peer windows networking in XP/2K. If your using XP home then disable simple file sharing. You can then setup your shares and apply permissions accordingly instead of using the $shares.

 

[buckmacuk]

Thanks ktwebb - the XP system is Home.

What is strange is that it all was working before - the userid/passwords DO match - it was the first thing I checked. The main reason this is such a pain ('cos I can set up networked drives - after signing in to the 2K machine- to auto-connect at logon and that works) is printer sharing. The main printer is on the 2K machine - and to get to it now, I have to perform a login from the explorer window.

I was under the impression that when access was required to a network resource, then on attempting access the current user credentials were used - however, that appears not to be the case - or it's broke.

Thanks, Chris B

 

[ktwebb]

Ah I see. So you get prompted for a credentials box, you type in the credentials and your then allowed into the resource. Is that correct?

If that is the case, I would reset the password for the account your using to login on the local machine and the remote machine account that matches that local account your using.

 

[classy]

Do you a have firewall running on the XP machine?

 

[buckmacuk]

Hi folks - problem is resolved!!

Found an item on another board which suggested the following:

Start - Run - 'control userpassword2'

Did that - saw a minor discrepancy on the primary account name and fixed it. Now, ALL accounts have the access I expected.

Just wondering about two things - firstly, what is this command?? And why is it 'hidden'? and secondly, why would an error on one account prevent all accounts from accessing automatically??

Thanks to all for the help and I hope this might help someone else sometime.

Cheers, Chris B

 

[Fardringle]

That command opens the dialog box to control (add/change/remove) the passwords that Windows XP stores in order to automatically log in to network resources. When you provide a user name and password for something and check the box "remember my password", this is where that information is stored.

You can get to that dialog box using the command you typed in your post, or you can use either of these two additional methods:

Click [Start] [Run] type Control keymgr.dll
or
Double-click User Accounts in the Control Panel, click the Advanced tab, then click the Manage Passwords button


It's really not any more 'hidden' than many of the other functions of Windows, you just have to know how to get to it.

As for why one incorrect entry would prevent access to all network resources, if the user name is the same on everything and one of the entries was corrupted somehow, that may have been causing Windows to try to use the bad entry for all access attempts. Either that, or the same (wrong) information was stored in every entry...