home network windows 7

[butterflies]

Hello,
I am trying to create a home network, so that we can share files between pc's TV and media player. Windows 7 has such a facility built in, it seems, which is a nice surprise, because I thought I was going to need network cards in all pc's.

If I go to Control Panel/Homegroup in Windows 7, I get a message that this pc cannot be connected. If I go to Control Panel/Network and Sharing Center it shows that there IS a Network (Network 6) and that my PC is connected to it. Anyhow this is just a small issue and it seems that I can work around it.

More important, when looking into other computers, I need a user name and password. Password I have, because I wrote that down when first PC's were connected with ethernet cables. But a USERNAME I cannot remember. How can I find the username????

any help here?

Thanks,
Rob

 

[JackMDS]

Maybe this can Help.
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The following looks like a long story (it is only 600 words). I do not know what the user's overall knowledge is, and what exactly was already done. Thus the info goes through the motions of configuring and checking most of the common aspects of Windows OS' LAN features.

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Win7 when configured on peer-to-peer Network has three types of Sharing configurations.

HomeGroup = Works only between Win 7 computers. This type of configuration makes it very easy to Entry Level Users to start Network sharing.

Home Network or Work Network = Basically similar(and better) to the previous methods of Work Group sharing that let you control what, how, and to whom folders would be shared with.

Public Sharing = Public Network (like Internet cafe) to reduce security risks.

For best results log to each computer's System Screen and set all the computers to be on a with the same Work Group name while each computer has its own unique name.
http://www.ezlan.net/Win7/net_name.jpg

Make sure that the Software Firewall, AV, or other components of Security allow free local traffic on all Networked computers. If you use 3rd party Security On, Vista/XP Native Firewall should be Off, and the active Firewall has to adjusted to your Network IP numbers on what is some time called the Trusted Zone (consult your 3rd Party Firewall instructions

General example, http://www.ezlan.net/faq.html#trusted

Please Note that some 3rd party Software Firewalls/AV/Security suits keep blocking aspects of Local Traffic even it they are turned Off (disabled). If possible configure the Firewall correctly, or totally uninstall it to allow clean flow of local network traffic.
If end up with the 3rd party software uninstalled or disabled, make sure that Windows native Firewall is On .
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If your network is comprised of Win 7 only and you want a simple Network, use this.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/help/videos/sharing-files-with-homegroup
After configuring the Homegroup scroll down to the Permission/Security section.
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Networking Win 7 with other version of Windows as Work Network (works very well if all computers are Win 7 too).
In the Network Center, clicking on the Network type opens the window to the right.
Choose your type of Network. Notice the check mark at the bottom, and check/uncheck it according to your needs.
http://www.ezlan.net/Win7/net_type.jpg
Win 7 - http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/Networking-home-computers-running-different-versions-of-Windows

Win 7 Work Network specific folder sharing - http://www.onecomputerguy.com/windows7/windows7_sharing.htm

Vista File and Printer Sharing- http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727037.aspx

Windows XP File Sharing - http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;304040

In Win XP Pro with simple sharing Off, you can Visually see the Permission/Security setting , and configure them to your liking.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/security/learnmore/accesscontrol.mspx#securityTab
Printer Sharing XP - http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/networking/expert/honeycutt_july2.mspx

Windows Native Firewall setting for Sharing XP - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875357

Windows XP patch for Sharing with Vista (Not need for XP-SP3) - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922120

When finished with the setting of the system it is advisable to Reboot all the hardware including the Router and all computers involved.
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If you have Permission and Security issues with Vista/Win7, check the following settings.


Point to the a Folder that meant to to be share. Right click and choose properties.


In the properties
Click on the Security tab shown in the pic bellow to the right) and check that the users and their permission (shown in the pic bellow center and left) are correctly configured. Then do the same to the Permission tab.
This screen shot is from Win 7, Vista's menus are similar.
http://www.ezlan.net/Win7/Permission-Security.jpg

In both the Security panel, and the Permission panel you have to highlight each User/Group and examine that the Permission Controls are checked correctly.


When everything is OK, Reboot the Network (Router, and computer).

* Note . The Groups and Users shown in the screen-shoot are just an example. Your list will look the way your system is configured.

**Note . All users that are allowed to share need to have account onall the computers that they are allowed to connect to.
Everyone is an account, it means a group of all of the users that already have an account and been established as users. It is available to avoid the need of configuring permission to each on its own, it does not mean
Everyone that feel that they would like to login.
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If more control is needed take a look at this page, http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-vista/Share-files-and-folders-over-the-network-from-Windows-Vista-Inside-Out

 

[butterflies]

Thank you for your extensive instructions. I will try working this out, but the thing is that i think i have it working already. The only thing lacking is the right USER NAME as i mentioned above. The pc asks for it when I try to look in another pc on the same home network. What could be that user name.

What I also would like to know is if I will be able to look with a (mede8er) mediaplayer (connected to the same network) into the pc's?

 

[chemwiz]

You can look in in control panel/user accounts to see the user names.

 

[JackMDS]

When you start Windows there is always a User Icon with a name that you have the click on.

Many people configure the computer to bypass the use name click but it is still there.

Log to Control Panel Users accounts and you will see the log in User.

When you log through the Network to another computer the other computer has to be configured to accept the user name from the computer that tries to connect to it. This is done by configuring Sharing/Security/Permission.

 

[butterflies]

I have tried all usernames and passwords that might be relevant to the problem. Nothing works. Please help.

What happens is whatever pc or media device I try to enter from whatever machine, I get this Windows Security window with the title Enter Network Password. It asks for a username and password. I DO have that password from when I was setting up the Network, but no bl..... USERNAME. I have tried the windows account names, the names of the pc's. I have also tried those in combination with the passwords from the pc's. No combination works!

On all machines it shows that there IS a network and I CAN see all machines that are switched on, including PC's, TV and mediaplayer.
Please advise.

 

[JackMDS]

http://www.howtogeek.com/96805/how-to-reset-your-windows-password-without-an-install-cd/

 

[butterflies]

This helped: changing the local security policy: Control Panel/ Administrative Tools/ Local Security Policy/Local Policies/ Security Options/ disable Limit local account use of blank password....

That is, I can access both PC's from one another and I can acces both PC's from the media player that I have near my TV. But for now there are some serious limitations it seems:

1 The access is only to the USERS folder on the system disk, not to any other folder or harddisk on the PC's. And within the USERS folder it does not show the main USER!

2 On the PC's I do not see the media player as being part of the Network. I was hoping to send data to the mediaplayer from the pc's as a local storage for my family.

Is there a way around this limitations?

3 I also don't see how I should make use of the PC's and TV being in the same network. Is there some way that I could send data to the TV directly from the pc's?

 

[azazel1024]

Yeah, every folder or drive you want to share, right click on it, go under sharing, advanced and then add the "everyone" user for whatever permissions you want them to have.

You'll be accessing the data FROM the mediaplayer, not too the media player. The media player likely does not have NETBIOS or LLDP enabled, so it isn't announcing itself on the local network. The key is seeing the PC that is sharing the media you want to play, from the media player. Not the other way around.

 

[butterflies]

Thanks for the directions. I can now see all harddisks on my pc through the mediaplayer. Just the mediaplayer (Mede8er MED600X) is bloody slow with even loading the thumbnails it takes minutes, And when I showed an image (they are roughly 6/7 MB) and return to the thumbnails, they start loading all over again. This is all wired, not WIFI! But I suppose I need to discuss this in another forum?!

 

[azazel1024]

I don't know that there is much to discuss. I don't know what the Mede8er is, but I suspect a much older media streamer? My old Seagate Free Agent Theater+, which would now be...5 years old? 6? was REALLY slow. One of the final updates made it painful. Even without showing thumbnails, it would take roughly 2 seconds per file in a folder, to load the folder. So a ~150 movie folder would take about 5 minutes before it would display it. The update before the final (Seagate discontinued support something like 3-4 years ago now, after it had only been on the market at MOST 2 years) worked fine though. All folders took only maybe 2-4s to display when navigating to them.

Image thumbnails were slow, but not terrible. Maybe .5s per thumbnail, but a 6-8MB JPEG would take about 2-3s to actually load when trying to view them full size (100Mbps wired network connection). So trying to flip through them was rather painful. Worked okay for SMB video streaming though. Finally ditched it as it was not nearly as nice as the AppleTV Gen3 that I ended up getting (even though it has been a pain to organize everything in iTunes, it is MUCH nicer than the Seagate FAT+).

 

[butterflies]

The Mede8er MED600X is the newest version of a brand that is well known for its speed. When I play directly from a harddisk connected to it the speed is fine. I do not understand why it should be so slow wired over ethernet.
When I play large jpegs or video over the same network from one pc to another there is no delay at all. Strange and a pity, because this is the main reason why I bought the player. And in the shop, as always, they were confident that it would do what I want. Ha.
Thanks for your reply anyway. I hate iTunes and everything with i.
I will not consider this. What I might try is to see if traffic will be faster through wifi, since the mede8er has wifi also. Just my pc not, but I might change that.

 

[azazel1024]

The Mede8er MED600X is the newest version of a brand that is well known for its speed. When I play directly from a harddisk connected to it the speed is fine. I do not understand why it should be so slow wired over ethernet.
When I play large jpegs or video over the same network from one pc to another there is no delay at all. Strange and a pity, because this is the main reason why I bought the player. And in the shop, as always, they were confident that it would do what I want. Ha.
Thanks for your reply anyway. I hate iTunes and everything with i.
I will not consider this. What I might try is to see if traffic will be faster through wifi, since the mede8er has wifi also. Just my pc not, but I might change that.

With DAS my old Seagate FAT+ worked very snapilly. Over the network, not so much. Whether it was an issue processing SMB, or it was an issue with a 10/100 port that didn't actually hit 100Mbps speeds, I can't say.

There is generally a lot more overhead with network file transfers than there is accessing local storage.