Windows 7: HomeGroup Has Quit Working

Hey guys, I had homegroup working between my two pc's w/o any issues. Yesterday I discovered they were no longer working.
After looking around I learned that 3 services need to be running for homegroup to work.
Peer Name Resolution, Peer Networking Grouping and Peer Networking Identity Manager.
Peer Networking Identity Manager is the only one running, and if I try to start the other two, Peer Name Resolution gives me error code 0x80630203: 0x80630203 and PN Grouping is dependent on PN Resolution.
To me, the strange thing is, both pc's are not starting these services with the same error code and it seems to have happened to both at the same time.
The only recent changes I can think of is both pc's were recently updated with about 14 windows updates from Update Tuesday and I'm using TeamViewer to control both pc's with one wireless kb and mouse, but almost certain homegroup was working fine while TeamViewer has been installed.
Does anyone have any ideas of how I might resolve this? I've looked thru some of the newly installed updates, but don't see anything that'd make me think it was the cause of this.



Any help would be greatly appreciated,
skilz853

Hi skilz853,

As the issue has only just started, have you tried to do a System Restore to before the issue started?

Hey severadsolo, thanks for the quick reply. I have thought of that, but was hoping to find a solution without restoring and loosing all the recent updates.
If I did restore and homegroup was fixed and one of the updates caused it, how would I discover which one, without installing one or a few at a time and see if that cause it to happen again.
I guess I may, but as a last resort. Hopefully there's a simpler way.

Thanks,
skilz853

Honestly, the method you've just describes is EXACTLY how I would go about it.

I would roll back to my restore point, and then disable automatic updating.

Then I would install updates 5 at a time, and see if any of them break it. As Win 7 creates a restore point every time you install updates, it's easy enough to roll back. If one of the blocks broke, I would then roll back and try that block one at a time, until I find the problem. Once I had established which update was causing the issue, I would then hide that update, and turn automatic updating back on (if you had it on to start with)

I doubt it's actually one of the updates... I'm sure we would have seen scores of people complaining by now, it's more likely it's a dodgy install of said update.

As you are having problems with Services, and I am a big advocate of not messing with Services unless you really have to. (So many borkages when you do that) That is all I can honestly with a clear concience recommend.

severedsolo, I opened Windows Updates and looked thru some of the updates as I said looking to see if I might see one that could have caused the problem.
These updates were done on 8/9/11. I can uninstall them one at a time from there. Do you think that if I did it that way, that I might see homegroup start working again? I'm not sure if I'd have to reboot after uninstalling each update or not. But if this seems feasible to you, I'd like to try it this way. What do you think?
I'm asking this cause system restore is turned off, as I use an app called RestoreIt to take me back to a previous date, cause I never have had any luck with system restore.

Thanks for sticking w/me. If I'm not making good sense, please forgive me as I'm out of a medicine that being w/o is making me very uncomfortable and I'm not concentrating very good,
skilz853

You can try it your way... it certainly can't do any harm. If it doesn't work, you can always go back to the Restore point (or whatever your apps equivalent is) anyway.

Presumably this app you use does the same basic function as SysRestore?

Edit: Just a thought... make a restore point first just in case,

Thanks for all your input. One more question. Here's a list of the installed updates. Does any stand out to you as the possible culprit?


Thanks again,
skilz853