Windows 7 Networking Sucks!

NNSVolunteer said:

...Win xp is hardwired. Win 7 is wireless...

Since the only computer not working right with the Network is the wireless one perhaps this is a problem with your wireless settings. Did the wireless adapter come with its own setup/config program?

That would be possible except the wireless win 7 gets on the internet. And last night I had the wireless XP laptop on and it played with the network just fine.

I guess another frustration is the apparent difference in windows 7 versions. My windows 7 doesn't have the same options that fixed someone's in May on this thread.

This fix from an earlier post does not work because my Win 7 doesn't have a "Local Security Policy" option.

*** UPDATE WITH FIX ***

I figured out what the issue was and it all had to deal with Windows Security. For anyone else that is interested in this fix, here is what I did.

Start>Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Local Security Policy

Then:

Local Policies>Security Options>Network Security: LAN Manager authentication level
Set it to Send LM & NTLM - use NTLMv2 session security if negotiated

****************************

I'll google from time to time and post if I ever find a solution.

It gets interesting with Post #4:

Need to change local security policy on Win7 starter

Read the thread and although I haven't mucked around the registry in windows 7 yet, I have managed to fix an early problem with Vista not requesting an IP with additions or changes to the registry.

BUT!! The pentultimate sentence of this referred post indicates it only partially solved the problem.

Talk about half baked OS's--My Home Premium doesn't have all the BASIC fuctionality of more pricey versions. I have to muck around in the registry. But first I need to be sure of where my Toshiba OEM restore disk is or make one lest I really muck things up. Tell me again how windows 7 is not SUCKING my time.

NNSVolunteer said:

Tell me again how windows 7 is not SUCKING my time.

You are right, it is sucking your time. Funny how you don't seem to take any notice of the time that others have spent in trying to help you.

Read some of the other threads here and pay attention to the tone of the people who come here asking for help. Did it ever occur to you that your attitude may be turning a lot of people off? People who might otherwise be willing to help you?

Did you ever wonder why you, and a handful of other like you, poor unfortunate soul that you are, were singled out among the over 175,000,000 people who have purchased Windows 7 to have to endure such deprivations?

Did you ever stop to think that if you put as much effort into describing your problem and trying to fix it as you do into griping that you might be closer to a solution?

Good luck with your problem.

I do appreciate the efforts of the Windows 7 forums to assist me and others. Before I retired I supervised a computer staff that provided assistance to our offices in a 4 state area. So, I have an intimate knowledge of the efforts individuals put forth to assist. The time that windows 7 doesn't suck up, I spend volunteering to a local charitable thrift store. I rebuild/rehab donated computers for their resale. A task I might add, that would be impossible without the internet, and helpful posts from the user community. My frustration is just kinda boiling to the top after spending about 3 hours a night for the past month trying to get win 7 to play nicely.

P.S. Found my oem restore CD's so will probably muck around the win 7 registry.

Will post any succesful results.

WORKAROUND SUCCESSFUL!!

To recap, my network consists of 3 xp machines hard wired, 1 xp wireless and 1 win 7 wireless attached to a netgear router. Am using WEP wireless security with a 26 digit hex code. From Christmas '09 'til about the middle of June this setup acted as a normal network. One of the XP machines I use as a print server for a Samsung Laser printer, another is a print server for an Epson color printer and the other wired xp is my has a large USB external drive connected--that I back up all pcs to using xcopy and/or robocopy.

During the above period I was able to do normal sharing and mapping of all the computers files and resources. Each computer could see all the others in windows explorer.

Then, with no changes to the network on my part, windows 7 went stealth and blind. The XP machines could not see it and it could not see the XP machines. I been googleing and trying various suggestions but nothing seemed to work. I disconnected all but one XP and the Win 7 machine from the network. Swapped routers, changed network names. Added IPv6 protocol to xp adapters. Removed all vestiges of security suites on these 2 computers and took down their windows firewalls. Still, they couldn't see each other.

Each was able to ping the others Ip address. Something may have clicked from one of the numerous posts I've viewed over the last month so here is the workaround.

*********************WORKAROUND!!

On win 7 machine I mapped the IP address plus folder to a drive letter e.g. \\192.168.1.10\c\mine and sure enough I was able to access that folder on the XP machine. Did the same for the XP machine mapped \\192.168.1.11\users\public and it also worked. Now for the printer, after trying various things I found that going to the Win 7 Devices & Printers>add network printer "Click on Printer Not Shown" in shared printer by name enter the ip address of your XP printserver. Mine is \\192.168.1.10\SamsungM and sure enough it connects and is printing. To further test, I did the same for the IP address of the XP machine that has the epson. It works tonight. CAUTION!! One thing working for me in this workaround is the ability of my router to reserve and IP address for a particular computer name & mac address.

The XP with the laser and the win 7 laptop are shut down each evening. Will only post again if it doesn't work tomorrow, or if win 7 suddenly works with the network in a NORMAL manner.

NNSVolunteer said:

WORKAROUND SUCCESSFUL!!

To recap, my network consists of 3 xp machines hard wired, 1 xp wireless and 1 win 7 wireless attached to a netgear router. Am using WEP wireless security with a 26 digit hex code. From Christmas '09 'til about the middle of June this setup acted as a normal network. One of the XP machines I use as a print server for a Samsung Laser printer, another is a print server for an Epson color printer and the other wired xp is my has a large USB external drive connected--that I back up all pcs to using xcopy and/or robocopy.

During the above period I was able to do normal sharing and mapping of all the computers files and resources. Each computer could see all the others in windows explorer.

Then, with no changes to the network on my part, windows 7 went stealth and blind. The XP machines could not see it and it could not see the XP machines. I been googleing and trying various suggestions but nothing seemed to work. I disconnected all but one XP and the Win 7 machine from the network. Swapped routers, changed network names. Added IPv6 protocol to xp adapters. Removed all vestiges of security suites on these 2 computers and took down their windows firewalls. Still, they couldn't see each other.

Each was able to ping the others Ip address. Something may have clicked from one of the numerous posts I've viewed over the last month so here is the workaround.

*********************WORKAROUND!!

On win 7 machine I mapped the IP address plus folder to a drive letter e.g. \\192.168.1.10\c\mine and sure enough I was able to access that folder on the XP machine. Did the same for the XP machine mapped \\192.168.1.11\users\public and it also worked. Now for the printer, after trying various things I found that going to the Win 7 Devices & Printers>add network printer "Click on Printer Not Shown" in shared printer by name enter the ip address of your XP printserver. Mine is \\192.168.1.10\SamsungM and sure enough it connects and is printing. To further test, I did the same for the IP address of the XP machine that has the epson. It works tonight. CAUTION!! One thing working for me in this workaround is the ability of my router to reserve and IP address for a particular computer name & mac address.

The XP with the laser and the win 7 laptop are shut down each evening. Will only post again if it doesn't work tomorrow, or if win 7 suddenly works with the network in a NORMAL manner.

This workaround is still working

I've worked with Windows networking since 1995 when I started as a Senior Support Engineer for Windows 95, Network Specialist. I've architected and worked with networks ranging from simple peer-to-peer systems to Enterprise domains. So I know Windows networking. Yes, it's true, Windows networking itself has not changed. But Microsoft has gone paranoid with security stuff that makes it suck.

For sharing and storing files, and running machine-to-machine backups, on my home network, it used to be simple. I would simply map a drive to the other machine's hidden Administrative Share (C$, D$, etc.), using the network machine's Administrator account, and everything just worked.

No more. I cannot connect to a Windows 7 machine's admin shares using the Admin account. Not with basic workgroup sharing. Not with the HomeGroup active. It just won't connect. It just asks for the password over and over and over and....

How can it be a security risk to connect to the Admin share using the Admin account?

I'm about to try the Security Policy settings suggested earlier in this thread. Just wanted to chime in with my complaint about Microsoft's making simple stuff hard with all their "Cover My A**" security crap.