[sylviasoven]

Hi Everyone,

So I've been working on trying to solve this problem for a long time, and nothing I do seems to help...

Here are the specs and the outline of the problem:

I am running XP on one PC and Windows 7 on another. I have set up a workgroup, which briefly worked. I have no idea why, but, my Windows 7 PC will no longer recognize that the XP computer even exists.

I've been looking up this problem, and it doesn't seem uncommon. Based on the "fixes" I tried following, I have now noticed the following additional problems:

-I cannot turn network discovery on without it immediately switching back.
--> I cannot access DNS client: enable, as it says I do not have permission to make this change...

I am running Zone alarm... I don't know if this helps. If you need any more specs, please let me know.

Thanks. Please help me figure this out before I spent the night pulling out my hair!

[sylviasoven]

additionally, I have confirmed that the workgroup names are both matching... I can access the windows 7 computer's shared files from the XP computer, but not the other way around.,..

Thanks again for your help, this is a matter of some urgency so I really appreciate any assistance in trying to fix this nightmare.

[TerryNet]

Start by uninstalling Zone Alarm. It may be corrupted or mis-configured. You can reinstall it after you get file sharing working.

Am I correct in assuming that you have enabled file sharing on the XP machine?

[sylviasoven]

Hi TerryNet,

Thanks for the reply. So I tried uninstalling Zone Alarm, it didn't change anything. File sharing is all set-up on the xp machine, and like I said I can access the files of the windows 7 pc but not the xp files from the windows 7 PC.

I looked into the problem and was lead to believe that I should turn network disc on, Win 7 pc, but alas it won't let me. When I looked into that, I was instructed to set four services to "automatic", DNS Client was the only service that I could not access and is currently disabled.

I'm able to ping the XP machine, and the internet works fine, etc. Just cannot access it from the Windows 7 Beast...

Hope that helps. Thank you, I eagerly await your instructions.

[TerryNet]

In a Run box (hold the Windows logo key and press r)on the Windows 7 machine try

\\IPofXP

where "IPofXP" is the IP address of the XP machine. (Note those first two characters are backwards slashes.)

If that works (shows the XP's shared folders) try the same but use the XP computer's name instead of its IP address.