Trouble with 2 PC network.

[SunRa]

I have 2 pc's -- one running win95 and the other win98. I am trying to get a simple file sharing/game playing network going between them. I have read numerous articles and I believe I am doing everything right, but they won't recognize each other (either in the network neighborhood or by pinging each other when I have TCP/IP installed). One is a soho isa pnp card, and the other is a Netgear PCI pnp card. The card's diagnostics all check out on both ends. I have tried direct connect with a crossover cable and with a hub in between. When I boot up one machine, I can see the access led's blink on the other card, so it looks like they are connected. This also occurrs when I try to ping the other. Right now I am just trying to get the most simple connection going. I removed all other adapters on each machine and only have NETBeiu installed. Each computer has a unique name and shares the same workgroup name. The microsoft client is installed and I have file/printer sharing enabled. On each machine I can see my own computer in the network neighborhood, but not the other. Am I blind and missing something obvious? I switched the cards around and introduced a third card (Intel isa ethernet pro/10+) and the same thing keeps happening. This is pointing towards user error, but I don't know what. Please help.

[bighammer]

turn off netbeiu and turn on tcp/ip and ipx.
Make sure you have the same workgroup for both machines

[GVolosky]

I believe you have to manually configure a share on the C drive before it will actually show up as connected in network neighborhood...Rt click My Comp. - Explore -
C - File - Properties - Sharing...
G.

[oldbe]

Look at all your drives etc. you want to "share" and right click them looking for sharing and do so with those you want to share. Go to Control Panel | Networking and look in the bottom below the dialog box for Primary Network Logon and enable "File and Print Sharing". Hope this helps.

[SunRa]

I've already tried these suggestions and a bunch of others. I tried changing the slots that the cards were in in each computer -- didn't help. I switch the cards from one computer to the other and it works fine! Problem is, I don't have room for the isa card in the Win95 pc (had to remove a nice legacy soundcard to try the switch out). Hopefully, it was the isa card that didn't work in the win98 machine rather than the pci card that didn't work in the win95 machine. Thanks for your help!

[fiddle_dog]

Try pinging 127.0.0.1 from your command prompt. If pinging is successful, you can assume that the TCP/IP stack is functioning. You might then check the physical connection.

If pinging fails, on the other hand, there is a problem on the PC from which you are pinging.

127.0.0.1 is the loop-back address to check to see whether your PC's TCP/IP stack is functioning.

This may not pin-point the problem, but may offer some areas to concentrate.

I hope this helps.

[blondini]

i have two computers w98\w95-isa\pci cards networked peer to peer for playing unreal etc and file sharing and found this set up to work great(using BNC)
:add TCP\IP also IPX\SPX (remove IPX\SPX for your dial up adapter,but leaving both for the network card)
:printer & file sharing
:client for microsoft
:in the TCP\IP properties dialogue box for the net card in the IP tab choose specify ip address, in the top box type in 192.168.0.112
(the last three can be anything up to say 222)in the other computer type in say 192.168.0.113 in the subnet mask box for both coms type in 255.255.255.0
:goto the IPX\SPX protocol properties box tick "i want to enable netbios etc" then in advanced tick "set this protocol to be default"
do this for both machines
choose LAN for the game multiplayers and enjoy,as long as both coms have the same workgroup and share level access both should show in net neighbourhood,also windows logon as the primary network logon to save typing in a password,hope this helps!

[SunRa]

Thanks for the good suggestions, but unfortunately I have tried all of these. Pinging localhost or 127.0.0.1 both work -- I just can't ping the other computer (my current address is 192.168.10.1 and the other is 192.168.10.2). I am also using the exact TCP/IP && IPX/SPX setup that is suggested to no avail. I think it might have something to do with these Soho cards and win98 since I tried to set up a similar lan on a dual win98 network to no avail. I even tried the latest win98 drivers from Soho. Anyway, I have something working with dual Netgear PCI cards now, so I know I'm not crazy and I had followed the correct steps. Thanks everyone!

[fiddle_dog]

You may have tried this already, but one other thing: Check to see if your browsing is enabled on at least one machine.

Network Neighborhood's Properties > Configuration > File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks > Properties. Highlight Browse Master and choose Automatic in Value box.

Any luck?

[JWood]

Sorry to say that I have the same problem between Win95 and Win98SE os computers. Using a new DLink 10/100+ PCI nic card on the W98 computer, a built-in nic on a W95 machine (even tried other W95 computers). All W95 computers will file share between them using a hub or via direct connect. Noticed that winipcfg shows NDIS5 as the adapter for the W98 computer instead of the name of the card itself (weird). Recently bought an SMC Barricade router that acts as the DHCP gateway and tried that too. The Barricade delivers the IP Address fine to the W95 box, but the W98 box had to be set to a static address, since something related to ICS was taking over, setting the address to the typical "ICS address range" on a permanent basis. Have even reinstalled W98SE over the top of the existing files, and know that ICS is not installed. Examined the registry, found an ICS entry in the DHCP section, cleared it, but still didn't clear the IP address. Now, with the static address forced to the router's address group, and the router being the gateway, I still can't get any other computer to connect via file sharing. Will try to install W98SE on a laptop to see if the two will see each other, but this has been alot of trouble. Somehow, there is something keeping the two computers from seeing each other. Noticed ICS-like components in the network card driver settings on the W98 computer for the new DLink card install when I view the System Information details via Accessories, System Tools. Also noticed that I have no IRQ's that can be isolated to the nic card only, due to the number of cards and devices on the system. Cannot find an IRQ that can be used to force the nic card to. I wants 10 and doesn't like any other that is chosen. This does not look like an IRQ problem, as the W98 system can see itself on the network, and I can see the shares which are set by using a browser, or by using RUN and "\\"computer name. Have searched everywhere, but information is not clear on specific files and registry settings specific to ICS and/or file sharing via a W98SE computer. My main objective is to use this expensive router to connect muliple pc's together to share the DSL connection, file sharing, print sharing, and gaming.
After hours of effort, I'm still looking to resolve. I will try to run the WinSock2 upgrade on the W98 and W95 pc's both as the next step, as I have resolved a similar connectivity problem when one PC couldn't file share with another. Sorry to introduce the same problem, which often times are two different problems, but just wanted to indicate that there IS someone else feeling the pain of not being able to file share between W95 computers and a W98SE computer as SunRa has!!!

[SysOpt]

SunRa: Email socalgal@sysopt.com after you have changed your email address in your profile to have this thread reopened. All of the "reply to" notification emails are bouncing to us as "User unknown" from your server.