Network Win7 and WinXP

Hi guys.

I've searched this site for this problem but none of the fixed have worked.

For many years I have WinXP 2002 SP3 on my desktop computer and I had Vista Home Premium 32bit on the my laptop they would both connect to each other no problem. I've had problems with IE8 on Vista always crashing with no fix available so I install Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 32bit on the laptop and it still connects to my WinXP desktop. I can't access my laptop from WinXP even though both are set to WORKGROUP. Now on Win7 the same as I did on Vista I set every folder I wanted to share with an additional Guest user and set it to read/write. I also set each folder with Share with Homegroup (read/write).

On WinXP I have a shortcut on the desktop Fujitsu-AMILO which is the laptop name which worked before but when I double click now it says:

\\Fujitsu-amilo is not accessible. You might not have permission to use this network resource. Contact the Administrator of this server to find out if you have access permissions.

Logon failure: user acount restriction. Possible reason are blank passwords not allowed, login hour restrictions, or a policy restriction has been enforced.

There is no password set on either system. I can do a search for computers on WinXP and Fujitsu-AMILO shows up but it shows the same message when I double click it.

I've read and checked every option in this thread but the problem still exists.

Any suggestions will be appreciated?

On the Windows 7 machine, you should first make sure that you are sharing the C:>Users folder which is a default setting which allows you to share folders which are inside of that particular folder. Picture below.

It may also be easier to put any files or folders you need to share with the XP machine inside the C:>Users>Public folders because the restrictions are eased up on these folders once you share them per the second picture. After that you can place a any file or folder into any of the Public folders on the Win7 machine and they will be shared out with the Workgroup machines.

I'm not sure why you would set permissions for a Homegroup because it's best not to have a Homegroup set up in this instance. :)

Cheers chev65 for the reply.

The C:\Users folders are set to share.

I shouldn't have to put all files and folders into C:\Users\Public folder as it worked perfectly on Vista.

chev65 said:

I'm not sure why you would set permissions for a Homegroup because it's best not to have a Homegroup set up in this instance. :)

It set all folder to read/write in Homegroup because the conventional method didn't work I just thought its additional feature of Win7. I've since remove all share settings from Homegroup and it still doesn't work.

Keithuk said:

Cheers chev65 for the reply.

The C:\Users folders are set to share.

I shouldn't have to put all files and folders into C:\Users\Public folder as it worked perfectly on Vista.

chev65 said:

I'm not sure why you would set permissions for a Homegroup because it's best not to have a Homegroup set up in this instance. :)

It set all folder to read/write in Homegroup because the conventional method didn't work I just thought its additional feature of Win7. I've since remove all share settings from Homegroup and it still doesn't work.

If you created a Homegroup you will want to leave the Homegroup because it will cause sharing problems with XP. Homegroup - Leave

It may help to use the same user name and password on both the XP and Windows 7 machines, this should give you access without the password prompt.

You should also be able to access the Win 7 or XP machine by typing it's LAN IP address in the run box \\192.168.x.x

The Public folders were actually designed just for this type of sharing, that is why there are Public folders for just about every category, Pictures, Music, Documents etc. this is by far the safest and easiest way to share between newer Op systems and older ones. There are countless good reasons for sharing this way.

I don't have any passwords on either machine.

I've remove all Homegroup share but it still doesn't work.

In my BT Home Hub Manager it shows my laptop is connected.

I got fed up with Windows 7 so I put Vista back and it works perfectly, so newer OS are no better.