LAN Problem (cannot share files/play games after format)

hi,

buddy of mine and me made some little lan over the holidays (just the 2 of us) to play some games and share some files but after he had to do a format our network doesnt seem to work anymore. there are 4 computers, 3 PCs and 1 MacMini running Windows. All systems have xp pro, all except one pc have 1Gpbs network. All computers go into one switch and the switch goes into the cable modem, ALL systems have internet but all of the systems have problem seeing each other in local network. we did try the network wizard so far aswell as restarting the modem and even formatting hes system again but the problem seems to remain.

another weird thing is that some of the pc can see each other or just one way, like my pc can see the mac but cannot see the other pcs. the mac can see mine but thats it, the 100mbit pc can only see the pc of my friend but hes computer cant see anybody.

any help would be apprieciated...

sometimes you have to wait a bit for everyones browser service to update its local peers.

it would help to know what ip address is assigned to all your computers, and whether or not you can do a simple ping test from each computer to each computer?

is the computer that you say has a problem, able to reach the internet?

all systems can reach the internet,

i can ping all computers IF i ping with ip, if i use the computer name it gives me an error that he cannot find the host.

Using network places? Number one would be to stop using that if your depending on it for network resource connectivity. Start, Run, then type the remote computer name via UNC path syntax is \\servername But if NP isn't working and you can't ping by name then name resolution isn't working. No big deal. In fact it's really to be expected if your using Broadcasts and the Master browser to resolve names, which is what it sounds like your using. Just use the IP instead. \\192.168.0.5 or whatever. Click enter. As long as something is shared and you dont' have a firewall issue you'll be good to go.

The Master browser will eventually work itself out as mentioned. You just need to bring all your machines down and boot them up one at a time, typically the strongest PC first to assume master browser roles. You can also edit your hosts file but this would typically be done for a LAN with static IP's. But most SOHO routers give pseudo static IP's anyway within their DHCP table.

im not sure if i undestand what you just said it sounds complicated tho
so far i always used \\name instead of the network places, connecting with ip addresses doesnt work either, im not sure but that could be because we have IPs from the network provider (like: 84.73.... and not 192....). the main problem tho is that we CANNOT see each other wich makes playing games over LAN impossible and thats what were most in need of

That's why someone mentioned posting your IP's. I'm a little suprised you ever had it working properly. Buy a $25 router.

isnt there any way without buying a new router? i mean it did work before theres gotta be a way to get that back :/

Give it a day or two for your router or whatever runs DHCP to drop the lease and lease a new address to the system.

I can go in right now and change my IP on any one of my PC's and I can't ping by name until my main PC running ICS sees the system with the new IP. Might take a day, might take two.

if you have a router and you tell it to ping Bob, it will ping the old IP address, but there's nothing there. If you set Bob to the old IP address, it works fine.

Resetting the ARP cache seems to have no effect here, I've tried it on every machine. After a few hours to a day, it starts working again with the new IP, pinging by PC name.

pxoint said:

isnt there any way without buying a new router? i mean it did work before theres gotta be a way to get that back :/

Click to expand...

You have public IP's. Bad idea. You want a SOHO router regardless of the name resolution working or not.