Network puzzle

Can anybody help before I become even more hairless! I've been trying to sort out this for many hours.

I have -

• a recently purchased Windows 7 Pro Lenovo T420 laptop which is wireless
• an XP Pro IBM T43 wireless laptop
  
• a Dell XP Home desktop connected to my wireless router by Ethernet cable - no wireless card
  

The problem is that the T420 is unable to access files in a shared desktop folder on the Dell. The following information may help -

• The T420 sees the Dell desktop shared folders and sub-folder, but not its files
• The T420 sees the T43 shared folder and files
• The T43 sees the Dell shared folder and sub-folder and files
• The T43 sees the T420 shared folder and files
• The Dell sees both the T420 and T43 shared folders and files

So far as I'm aware I've set all the appropriate "sharings" and permissions. The three machines are all in the same workgroup. The T420 is set to "Work Network", and is not in a Homegroup.

I've read numerous on-line discussions regarding network problems, but not come across this issue.

I'd be grateful for any helpful thoughts. Thank you..

Try the first paragraph in the link. You really should use the Public folders on the Win 7 machine to share with Older Op systems.

How to make Windows 7 work with older Windows versions for networking and file sharing.

It can also help to get around password problems if you use the same username and password on all machines in the LAN.

After going through all of that if you are still having file access problems try doing this registry adjustment on the Win 7 machine with the problem.

Solution is really easy just modify one key in registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System
create or modify 32-bit DWORD: LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy
set the value to: 1

Chev65 - Thanks for the quick reply.

I read the link, and I think all my settings are ok. The PCs are all in the same workgroup - Mshome; Advanced Sharing Settings are all as described; "permissions" is set to "everyone" on the XP Home folder I'm trying to access from the Windows 7 PC; my third-party firewall on the XP Home allows access by the XP Pro PC - might it treat differently access by the Win 7?. None of the PCs is password protected. With some trepidation I modified the registry as suggested. The key wasn't present beforehand and, unfortunately, creating it made no difference.

Thanks for your suggestions.

Chev65
As suggested, I temporarily disabled the XP Home firewall, but still couldn't access the files in the subfolder. However, I think I've made some progress - although I'm not clear on how to explain it!

I created some new subfolders on the XP Home PC and shared between them the original, inaccessible astronomy graphics .avi and .bmp files - sizes up to the 100+Mb range. I then created a simple .txt test file, and stored it in one of the subfolders, which then contained some graphics files and the .txt file. When I tried to access this XP Home subfolder contents using the Win 7 PC, the .avi files and the .txt file were visible, but would not open - in fact Win 7 Explorer stopped responding and the screen "greyed out". Next, I moved the .avi files leaving the text file alone. Win 7 then saw and opened this file successfully. I moved the .avi files back, which recreated the problem - Explorer stopped responding, then removed them again - problem cured!

When I transferred the .avi files to the Win 7 PC using a USB memory stick - no problem, the images were instantly available.

It appears that my wireless Win 7 PC will not accept these .avi files across my network from the Ethernet XP Home PC, although it will accept them from the wireless XP Pro PC. Could it be simply the large file sizes, or that the XP Home PC is connected by Ethernet to the router, rather than wireless?

Could it be significant that Windows 7 Service Pack 1 for X64 (KB976932) has failed to install five times during the two weeks I've owned the PC.

Thanks again for your help.

HS1 said:

Chev65
As suggested, I temporarily disabled the XP Home firewall, but still couldn't access the files in the subfolder. However, I think I've made some progress - although I'm not clear on how to explain it!

I created some new subfolders on the XP Home PC and shared between them the original, inaccessible astronomy graphics .avi and .bmp files - sizes up to the 100+Mb range. I then created a simple .txt test file, and stored it in one of the subfolders, which then contained some graphics files and the .txt file. When I tried to access this XP Home subfolder contents using the Win 7 PC, the .avi files and the .txt file were visible, but would not open - in fact Win 7 Explorer stopped responding and the screen "greyed out". Next, I moved the .avi files leaving the text file alone. Win 7 then saw and opened this file successfully. I moved the .avi files back, which recreated the problem - Explorer stopped responding, then removed them again - problem cured!

When I transferred the .avi files to the Win 7 PC using a USB memory stick - no problem, the images were instantly available.

It appears that my wireless Win 7 PC will not accept these .avi files across my network from the Ethernet XP Home PC, although it will accept them from the wireless XP Pro PC. Could it be simply the large file sizes, or that the XP Home PC is connected by Ethernet to the router, rather than wireless?

Could it be significant that Windows 7 Service Pack 1 for X64 (KB976932) has failed to install five times during the two weeks I've owned the PC.

Thanks again for your help.

That is a very strange problem but really no idea why the avi file would be problematic here.

It could be the service pack problem but there are many reasons why SP1 might not install correctly.