Networking headache - please help!!

slobbery

I have a 5 computer network (2 wireless, 3 wired) connected to a Netgear wired/wireless router. 1 is running media centre xp, 3 are xp and 1 is Millenium.
Last week I installed the media extender for my xbox 360 on the media pc (which is wireless). I now no longer have a working network although each computer can still access the internet individually - so I'm fairly sure the router is ok.
I have renamed the network and run the networking wizard on all pc's, but only one of the xp ones can see all the computers in entire network, all the others only show themselves.
When I click the icon for another computer all I get is a message that says
I might need permission from the administrator and the network path is not found.
Have tried turning off all the firewalls, and also tried
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;318030
but still nothing.
Any ideas, please help as kids are driving me mad cos they can't play cossacks over the network.

mondayuk

Ok, first things first.
Write down a table of all of the computers names and IP addresses.
Then on each computer pull up a command prompt and type "ping <computername>" (e.g. ping officecomputer) and press enter.

You'll either get this sort of thing:
Pinging officecomputer [192.116.77.25] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.116.77.25: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 192.116.77.25: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 192.116.77.25: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 192.116.77.25: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128

Ping statistics for 192.116.77.25:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

or:
Ping request could not find host <computername>. Please check the name and try again.

If it's the latter then try again, but this time with the computer's IP address (e.g. ping 192.168.0.1). If that works (and I suspect it will) come back and i'll give you some other stuff to try.

darktrader

slobbery wrote:

...Last week I installed the media extender for my xbox 360 on the media pc (which is wireless). I now no longer have a working network...

That might be the key. Have you checked that your Router is compatible?

Either check on this list http://www.xbox.com/en-US/live/connect/routerlanding.htm#routers
or on the (router) manufacturers website.

slobbery

Ok tried names and ip adresses all I get is ping timed out Lost=4. Apart from one which pinged ok to one of the computers.

mondayuk

What are the IP addresses and subnet masks for all of the computers?

worrieddad_4

First things first, if the last thing you did is add the extender, take it off. Does it work? If so, at least you know what caused the problem.

If all PC's can access the network then nothings wrong with the router. In addition to the ping, once its failed, do a arp -a command.

If you see something like this:

192.168.11.10 0-11-50-20-64-2b dynamic

Then its likely to be a firewall issue.

If nothing appears then its more fundamental than that!

HTH
Martin

slobbery

192.168.0.2
192.168.0.3
192.168.0.5
192.168.0.6
192.168.0.7
subnet masks all say 255.255.255.0

mondayuk

Beyond firewalls preventing them, all PCs should be able to ping each other by IP address as they are all in the correct range. Make sure windows and third party firewalls are off. I have no experience with the Xbox media extender but I cant imagine what it could do to prevent the pings, although I agree that this does appear to be what started it all. Also, try restarting the router. Sounds daft but i've know routers to "fall out" with wireless clients until you give the router a reboot.

slobbery

Router is netgear DG834G - it's not mentioned on xbox compatibility but it works fine with xbox live and the media pc.
I did the arp -a and got 192.168.0.1 00-09-5b-ad-45-16 dynamic

tigermatt

Try removing the Xbox adapter extender thing and then restart your PC and see if it works. If it does then that is the problem, if it still doesn't work then we will look into it again.

slobbery

Thanks everyone, i think I've got it mostly working now (Millenium pc still a bit reluctant to play).
Had to manually add ip addresses to firewalls on all comps. Not sure why, never had to do that before.
This seems to have sorted things out.