Network Config, Topology and Connectivity Issues.

Hi All,

Though I frequent these forums, this is my first post. I appreciate the helpful community here.

So I am a t1 Tech for a small company that primarily does multimedia/design etc. They just started branching into IT managing/support services and hired me to see if it's an avenue they want to stick with. I'm still in school for Network Admin and am by no means an almighty tech guru (but hope to be one day).

One of our clients is a small medical office, with quite an interesting network topology. Mainly because they have bounced around from one IT support firm to another and hiring high-school kids to come in and try and fix things.

Following is their current network map which I did NOT design:



Additional Information:

I am not at work right now, so the map is fairly vague as I do not have access to the client master record with ipconfig and hardware info, I am hoping however, to be able to paint a generalized picture and maybe get some advice on my current problem. I will be able to post much more specific information tomorrow.

The problem:

So, Term 03 is a brand new HP laptop. It has Windows 7 ultimate x86 and the new WiMax 6200 series wireless N integrated adapter. After setting up the computer and installing all peripherals the client requested I began the initial network configuration for this machine. It was able to join the office Homegroup, the workgroup and can see all other systems on the network, however, when trying to access/file share with any of them, access was denied as the network path was not found. I power cycled everything, checked the DHCP settings as Windows suggested and still no dice. The other interesting thing is, from another system, I can access public folders on Term 03, but from Term 03 i can't access shared assets on other terminals.

Of course Discovery is on and all permissions I can think of that would effect this are enabled including exceptions within Eset's firewall. Internet access from Term 03 is just fine, only when trying to obtain shared assets from the server etc, does Windows say the network path isn't found.

My plan of action tomorrow is to go straight to the switch the Server is connected to and hardline it, if i still can't access shared resources it will help me eliminate and/or identify where the connectivity hang ups might be hiding out.

Any ideas? Again I apologize for the lack of specific info, I was just planting a seed to be able to go into work tomorrow with some new ideas.

Any help is uberly appreciated.

Is the Time/Date and the Time Zone set correctly on the New HP (Term03) machine? I would check that first. -WS

ktBlueLeaf said:

Yeah, you have to sync to windows time server to be able to join a homegroup most of the time anyhows.

Yes, but many times I have seen this not work. Windows has a bad habit of not setting the time if the TimeZone is wrong, the computers date is off by a lot, or the time is off by a lot. I am now in the habit of first checking the date/time and the timezone in networking issues, this is resolved many networking issues that our IT crew has spent many many many hours trying to figure out. I am not saying this is definitely your problem but it is a starting point. -WS