Can ping shared drive but not access

[Righty]

I created a shared drive for my company on a workstation on our network. We are using DHCP. All the other computers in the office can access the shared drive either by the IP address or the DNS address. Computers within the company but not in this building can ping the address by both the IP or DNS addresses but cannot access the shared drive. They are receiving messages that the network cannot be found. The shared drive is not userid or password protected. Any ideas what I should be looking for so these other workstations can see the shared drive?

 

[pansophic]

It sounds as if you have a router or firewall that is not forwarding ports 135-139 between you and the other computers in your company. But be VERY careful if you find that this is the case. The MS Blaster worm that is running rampant over the past couple of days exploits a vulnerability on port 135. If you haven't patched your system(s), I'd do so before I made any rule/ACL changes.


pansophic

 

[Serbtastic]

Network shares use netbios names to connect, so you will either need a WINS server in your environment, or you can edit the local LMHOSTS file on each computer, and add the IP and netbios name of the machine that houses the share.

 

[bcastner]

Quote: "The shared drive is not userid or password protected."

Yikes.

net use x: \\xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx\sharename

 

[John Lewis]

pansophic has the right idea. I am guessing that you are using a DSL/Cable or other internet connection to link the buildings. In response to the latest worm, many ISPs have been blocking ports used by the worm, which happen to be the same ones used for MS file sharing. Nothing wrong with that, other than they should have done it a long time ago -- that's a different rant.

Only option you have to continue using your current connection is to establish some kind of VPN between the sites. That will let you pass the traffic through on a different set of ports securely. While you're at it, sounds like you need to seriously think about a firewall on both sides.

bcastner also had it right -- YIKES! Sad, but this situation is very common. I am seeing a lot of this situation here -- using an internet connection directly for file sharing. Generally with no other security in place.

This is going to become a common question as the ISPs start to take responsibility for their segment of the internet.

 

[NBAbueg]

I'm having the same problem here. I can ping all computer/server within the network, and vice versa, but I'm unable to map to a drive to this server, or map to a different location to another computer/server. It also says "network cannot be found". All computers are on the same router.

 

[NBAbueg]

Righthy, I found the answer to my problem. Make sure your NETBIOS is enabled on your 2000/2003 machine. Then you'll need a user account to the 2000/2003 server to connect from the remote machines.

 

[maotx]

All windows os have a service called Computer Browser. If you don't have a WINS server, the computer browser will actually serve as a makeshift wins server. One computer will be initiated as the "master browser". It holds all the names and ips of the computers in your network. It generally takes up to a half hour for it to become accurate. The only problem with this is that it is difficult to discover which computer is the master browser. What you should do if you dont want to mess with the lmhosts files, is to disable computer browser on all machines except one. Keep this one machine on all the time. If not, then when it is shut off or another comptuter boots up, the master browser is switched and most of the stored ips are lost for another half hour. The ideal situation is to configure the lmhosts files on the machines if you cant get a WINS server installed. However, setting up the lmhosts files won't work if your ip is dynamic. If that is the case, a WINS server or computer browser is your only option.