can't get Windows 7 HomeGroup to work

I spent some time going through previous threads on home group problems but didn't see anything that seems to address my issue.

I once used home group some years ago between my wife's computer and my laptop and had zero problems. I have long since removed that link.

Now I have built a workstation and I can't get it to set up a home group with my laptop

• I created a home group on the workstation
• I set the Norton Security firewall to Full Trust
• I copied/pasted the home group pass word and transferred it in a text file to the laptop (via thumb drive) just so there would be no chance of not getting it right.
• I then went to the laptop and put the Norton firewall on Full Trust
• I then told the laptop to join the home group, which it sees, using the same password as on the workstation, but it says it can't do that.
• It suggested running the network diagnostics, but that showed no problem
• It suggested running the network diagnostics on the workstation but that showed no problems either.

Both computers see the other on the network and both computers agree that there is a home group and both computers agree that the laptop can't join the home group.

I've considered kicking the case of the workstation or spitting on the keyboard of the laptop but that just seems spiteful and probably not helpful

What to do ... what to do ...

Thanks for any help.

Kari said:

A long shot but worth to check: Homegroup requires all machines to have exactly the same time, quite often issues like yours can be solved simply by synchronizing the clock on all machines using the same time server.

See this tutorial on our sister site the Vista Forums for instructions, it applies to Windows 7, too: Internet Time Synchronization

Kari

Thank you but as I should have noted above, that was clear in the directions and I checked that the clocks were synchronized. I even opened the second hand display to verify that they are good down to the second even though I assumed, correctly I believe, that it's really only the hours that can differ because each machine's time is slaved to the same ISP and only by setting the hours different relative to GMT could you make the clocks differ.

Bongo said:

You said you copied/pasted the homegroup password, every time I joined a homegroup and copied/pasted the password it did not work had to type it in.

Jerry

Thanks, but I did actually try it by hand first, VERY carefully, and when that didn't work I did the cut/paste. In both cases what showed up on the laptop was the correct password, so I don't think that's likely to be the problem. Of course since I have no idea what the problem IS, it's hard to say ...