Homegroup issue

[Dragonschild]

Ok, I did some looking around and couldn't find a thread that dealt with this yet. I may have missed it and if I did a link to the thread would be helpful and you have my apology for posting about something that has already been solved.

That being said here is my issue:

I just got my Homegroup set up yesterday I have 5 computers connected (3 wireless and 2 wired), the problem is that one of the computers can only see select computers on the homegroup and all i can do is see the folders that I can access. If I try to open the folders the computer acts like its doing something for a few seconds and then it just stops and doesn't open the folder. I checked to make sure all folders were shared and double checked my antivirus and firewall to make sure that they allowed it as well, even though the other computers on the homegroup can see each other and access all shared folders...even the shared folders on the one computer that cannot access anything which I thought was strange. I hope that I was clear in my description of the problem if not I will be glad to clarify.

 

[Product FRED]

Switch from homegroup to workgroup and disable IPv6 in your LAN connection properties. That should do it.

 

[Dragonschild]

Switch from homegroup to workgroup and disable IPv6 in your LAN connection properties. That should do it.

So I should switch all the computers from homegroup to workgroup or just the one that is having trouble? Clearly I need to spend more time learning this new OS. This is also the first time I have set up an entire network with a purpose other than accessing the internet to surf the web, and I am learning quite a bit from this experience as well. I think when I get my HTPC set up with easy access to my media I will get into the OS exploration and I will be spending a lot of time reading these forums as well.

 

[Product FRED]

Switch all of them. Workgroup ensures maximum compatibility and is what previous versions of Windows used.

 

[chev65]

Actually there are many ways to fix this problem and getting rid of Homegroups isn't one of them.

This can be one of two problems.
1. Click Start. Search for run and press enter. In the field, type regedit and press OK.

2. In the registry, navigate to the following key.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip6\Parameters]
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
\SYSTEM
\CurrentControlSet
\Services
\Tcpip6
\Parameters
​

3. In the right pane, right-click on “DisabledComponents” and select modify. In the value data field, type “0″ (without quotations) and press OK. If the value was set to ``FF``, it was turned off.
4. Reboot your computer and it should work. It did for me.

Or try this.... Go to C:\Windows\ServiceProfiles\LocalService\AppData\Roaming\PeerNetworking and delete all of the files in this folder. Now restart the computer.

Other things to check...

Why can’t I access my HomeGroup?



There are several reasons why you can’t access your HomeGroup. Here are the most popular reasons for not being able to connect to your HomeGroup.

• Your computer might not be connected to the network the HomeGroup is on. Make sure the computer has network/Internet access. Try having Windows 7 troubleshoot the Internet connection for you.
• Your network location might not be set to Home. Learn how to check and change your network location if needed.
• Network Discovery might be turned off. Learn how to turn Network Discovery back on.
• Other computers in the HomeGroup might be turned off.
• Other computer in the HomeGroup might not be sharing files. Learn how to share files using HomeGroup.
• Maybe someone changed the HomeGroup password. Try checking the HomeGroup password on other computers in the HomeGroup. If the HomeGroup password was changed, change the HomeGroup password on your computer.
• Your computer might not yet be joined to a HomeGroup. Learn how to join or create a HomeGroup.
• Turn off any third party firewalls (usually bundled with antivirus software) that are installed on your computer.

If none of these troubleshooting tips work, try restarting your computer, or leave and then re-join the HomeGroup.


Check list for Homegroups, very good info here.
http://helpdeskgeek.com/windows-7/wi...-to-homegroup/

 

[Dragonschild]

Actually there are many ways to fix this problem and getting rid of Homegroups isn't one of them.

This can be one of two problems.
1. Click Start. Search for run and press enter. In the field, type regedit and press OK.

2. In the registry, navigate to the following key.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip6\Parameters]
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
\SYSTEM
\CurrentControlSet
\Services
\Tcpip6
\Parameters
​

3. In the right pane, right-click on “DisabledComponents” and select modify. In the value data field, type “0″ (without quotations) and press OK. If the value was set to ``FF``, it was turned off.
4. Reboot your computer and it should work. It did for me.

Or try this.... Go to C:\Windows\ServiceProfiles\LocalService\AppData\Roaming\PeerNetworking and delete all of the files in this folder. Now restart the computer.

Other things to check...

Why can’t I access my HomeGroup?




There are several reasons why you can’t access your HomeGroup. Here are the most popular reasons for not being able to connect to your HomeGroup.

• Your computer might not be connected to the network the HomeGroup is on. Make sure the computer has network/Internet access. Try having Windows 7 troubleshoot the Internet connection for you.
• Your network location might not be set to Home. Learn how to check and change your network location if needed.
• Network Discovery might be turned off. Learn how to turn Network Discovery back on.
• Other computers in the HomeGroup might be turned off.
• Other computer in the HomeGroup might not be sharing files. Learn how to share files using HomeGroup.
• Maybe someone changed the HomeGroup password. Try checking the HomeGroup password on other computers in the HomeGroup. If the HomeGroup password was changed, change the HomeGroup password on your computer.
• Your computer might not yet be joined to a HomeGroup. Learn how to join or create a HomeGroup.
• Turn off any third party firewalls (usually bundled with antivirus software) that are installed on your computer.

If none of these troubleshooting tips work, try restarting your computer, or leave and then re-join the HomeGroup.


Check list for Homegroups, very good info here.
http://helpdeskgeek.com/windows-7/wi...-to-homegroup/

Holy...wow! I will give this a try before I get rid of the homegroup and start a workgroup. it will have to be put on the back burner for right now though because when I went home yesterday to do some work on my computer I couldnt get anything to run. I know I should start another thread for this but seeing as its my own thread anyways and I have some people already replying I will throw it out there.
When I booted up my computer yesterday morning to do some video work every program that I started up would stop responding and I couldn't close it out. I tried task manager and end task, I also tried ending the process for the program in the process menu and neither way worked. So I restarted my computer, also I had to change my boot order from CD-HDD-Other to HDD-CD-Other because it wouldn't boot up for some reason, after the reboot the same thing would happen, I tried 5 different programs and the same happened with all of them. Suprisingly the only thing that would work right is my internet browsers( I checked both IE8 & Firefox), I could start them up visit websites and watch videos on youtube, listen to streaming music and when I was done I could close it out and it didn't hang or stop responding at all. Also another thing to note is that my CPU and RAM never spiked at all, during any of these program freeze-ups. Any thoughts?

 

[chev65]

Well it certainly gives you more options than just getting rid of Homegroups now doesn't it? Hopefully you will get back to this and get Homegroups working. There are zero reasons not to use Homegroups if you are running Windows 7 machines.

 

[Product FRED]

Well it certainly gives you more options than just getting rid of Homegroups now doesn't it? Hopefully you will get back to this and get Homegroups working. There are zero reasons not to use Homegroups if you are running Windows 7 machines.

Compatibility is one of the reasons not to. Switching to workgroup is the most immediate fix, usually.

 

[Dragonschild]

Well it certainly gives you more options than just getting rid of Homegroups now doesn't it? Hopefully you will get back to this and get Homegroups working. There are zero reasons not to use Homegroups if you are running Windows 7 machines.

Compatibility is one of the reasons not to. Switching to workgroup is the most immediate fix, usually.

There should be no compatibilty issues though because all the computers are running either x86 or x64 versions of windows 7. Oh well, I will give Chev65's method a try as soon as I figure out what is going on with my main machine.

 

[CarlTR6]

Ok, I did some looking around and couldn't find a thread that dealt with this yet. I may have missed it and if I did a link to the thread would be helpful and you have my apology for posting about something that has already been solved.

That being said here is my issue:

I just got my Homegroup set up yesterday I have 5 computers connected (3 wireless and 2 wired), the problem is that one of the computers can only see select computers on the homegroup and all i can do is see the folders that I can access. If I try to open the folders the computer acts like its doing something for a few seconds and then it just stops and doesn't open the folder. I checked to make sure all folders were shared and double checked my antivirus and firewall to make sure that they allowed it as well, even though the other computers on the homegroup can see each other and access all shared folders...even the shared folders on the one computer that cannot access anything which I thought was strange. I hope that I was clear in my description of the problem if not I will be glad to clarify.

Are all of the computers running Windows Seven? Home groups was designed for Windows Seven computers. You can make it work with computers of different OS's; but it is a hassle.

Chevy got me on the right track and I got my XP computer to work in homegroup with my Seven computer; but if I had several non Seven OS computers, I'd use workgroup.

 

[Dragonschild]

Alright, I tried what you suggested Chev65 but I could not locate "DisabledComponents" under parameters there was a "Default" option and "Dhcpv6duid". I tried the other method you listed but once I got to the LocalService folder I could go no further, there was no appdata. I checked all the options that you listed on the bottom of your post as well to make sure that network discovery was on and so on. everything was set the way it is supposed to be. Is there some kind of issue where wired and wireless connections have an issue seeing and accessing each other? because I keep finding more things going wrong here. Now from my main PC which is wired to the router cannot see my HTPC which is wireless but it can see my daughters pc which is also wireless. I cannot see my media storage PC though and it is wired to the router. The wierd thing is that I can see them under the Network menu but not the Homegroups menu. I am thinking that it would be best to just redo this entire network and homegroup from scratch to make sure that everything gets set up the right way. Any thoughts?

 

[CarlTR6]

Redoing it is certainly an option. Since all computers are running Seven, homegroups should be easy and work well.

 

[Dragonschild]

Redoing it is certainly an option. Since all computers are running Seven, homegroups should be easy and work well.

Alright, after a few days I have gotten back to this issue. I removed all computers from the homegroup and started a new one. This time around I have gotten all the computers to see each other on the homegroup however I still have that one computer that refuses to look into folders from other computers, it can see every other computer in the homegroup and I can click on them to see which folders are shared but when I try to look in the folders(any folders at all that are not native to this computer) the computer attempts to load the contents and then just stops loading and nothing happens. I have tried looking in folders on all 4 other computers from this computer and the same thing happens. I do not know what to do about this. at first I thought I would not be able to look into that computers shared folders from the others as well but on further exploration I found that every other computer on the homegroup can look at all shared folders even folders from the computer that cannot look into anything at all. There has to be a way to fix this because it just does not make sense for only one computer out of five all running windows 7 to have this issue.

 

[CarlTR6]

I hope Chevy will see this and jump in. He is good with Win 7 homegroups. I'm trying to think of things that could be unique to that computer.

1. Check the firewall, anti-malware and anti-virus settings in case something is being blocked. If you disable these, do you still have the problem?

2. Check the services related to networking running on the computer that is not seeing the files with one that is able to see the files.

The is just a grasp for ideas of what could be different with that one machine.

 

[Dragonschild]

I hope Chevy will see this and jump in. He is good with Win 7 homegroups. I'm trying to think of things that could be unique to that computer.

1. Check the firewall, anti-malware and anti-virus settings in case something is being blocked. If you disable these, do you still have the problem?

2. Check the services related to networking running on the computer that is not seeing the files with one that is able to see the files.

The is just a grasp for ideas of what could be different with that one machine.

Thank you for the response, I will check the settings for the anti-virus and firewall and see if that is the issue I will also try disabling them for a minute to see if I can get through that way.

 

[chev65]

If there is an AV involved then all bets are off on this working correctly. It's best to completely uninstall the AV's or just don't install them until after you have the network set up and working correctly.

Disabling certain AV's or third party firewalls doesn't always seem to fix the problem and they sometimes need to be completely uninstalled,then reinstalled after you have the network up and running.

Most of the AV's will see the new network and create rules for the network once it's up and running but installing them before you set up the network usually just creates problems.

 

[chev65]

Well it certainly gives you more options than just getting rid of Homegroups now doesn't it? Hopefully you will get back to this and get Homegroups working. There are zero reasons not to use Homegroups if you are running Windows 7 machines.

Compatibility is one of the reasons not to. Switching to workgroup is the most immediate fix, usually.

I have set up Homegroups on 6 completely different machines, also helped countless others get it up and running, never had a single problem with any of my machines working with Homegroups no matter how old or outdated they were.

Some of my machines are more than ten years old and Homegroups works flawlessly with everyone of them so I find it hard to believe that it could be a compatiblity problem.

There are of course other things that can go wrong with Homegroups but that usually involves an AV or third party firewall or the router isn't capible of supporting IPv6. Sometimes the router is simply outdated and doesn't support Win 7 in which case a firmware update or a new router is required. No doubt there are a couple other problem like the registry fixes that need to be addressed but that doesn't seem to relate to a compatlity problem.

AV's and third party firewalls also cause countless problems with Homegroups. Avast and AVG are famous for ruining Homegroup functionality. Not to mention Apples infamous Bonjour service.

I guess that could be considered a compatiblity problem but it's not directly related to Homegroups itself.

 

[CarlTR6]

If there is an AV involved then all bets are off on this working correctly. It's best to completely uninstall the AV's or just don't install them until after you have the network set up and working correctly.

Disabling certain AV's or third party firewalls doesn't always seem to fix the problem and they sometimes need to be completely uninstalled,then reinstalled after you have the network up and running.

Most of the AV's will see the new network and create rules for the network once it's up and running but installing them before you set up the network usually just creates problems.

Thanks, Chev; I was sure hoping you would step in. That AV thing may be one of the reasons I had extra trouble getting my XP machine into the homegroup. I disabled them; but did not uninstall them. Now I know.

 

[Dragonschild]

Chev! thank you for coming by my thread again. As suggested by Carl I tried disabling the AV but it still didn't work. I am using Avast on all my machines here at home so again it would be strange that it would only bother one of them and not the others. I will try uninstalling it from that machine and rejoining the homegroup to see if that helps. I am not using a firewall currently because I was trying to get the network all set before installing them. I hope that the uninstall works because this is just a pain in the arse. Will post back in a little while with results of test .

Thanks for all your help guys, you are making this experience less stressful by helping me work it out.

*edit*
So I tried uninstalling the AV, was a whole process of booting in safe mode to get rid of Avast. Kind of a pain in the butt, however it was removed and computer was restarted after leaving the homegroup. Rebooted in normal mode to rejoin Homegroup with the same results as before......what the heck is going on here!!

 

[CarlTR6]

Have you compared the list of services running in a machine that can see the files with the list of the one that can't see the files? I am sure you have checked and compared the network settings.