Peer-to-peer network insanity 2

[mcklsn]

I have a small, in-home peer-to-peer network with 2 XP professional nodes and 1 XP home node. One of the XP pro nodes has 2 printers on it that are shared over the network by the other 2 systems. I have a Linksys wireless router that attaches by cable to the system with the printers and by wifi to the other 2 systems. It also has a cable modem attached to it so all 3 systems have access to the internet. Since this is my family, I have not tried to block access between systems. Everybody could see everybody else, and things were running fine until about 2 weeks ago. I needed to upgrade the C drive on the system with the printers, so I bought Norton Ghost 9.0, made an exact copy of the C drive, copied it onto a larger drive, put it into the system, and things came up and worked just like Norton said they would EXCEPT...the permissions between the systems on the net are all screwed up. The XP home system can't see anybody else and can't see the printers to print. The XP pro systems can mostly see each other and both can print. All three can still access the internet. No matter how I set the sharing flags and open up the security on all the systems, I can't get anything to change at all. Even logging in as the administrator doesn't change anything, and, of course this how I learned that XP home doesn't really have an administrator mode even though it looks like it does. I've been trying everything I can think of for 2 weeks now, and for my next step, I'm seriously considering the use of nitroglycerin. I would truly pay a lot for a tool that would give me easy access to all the permission and security details of these systems and bypass all the XP nonsense. Is there any hope of help out there? Can anyone point me in the right direction to find out how to fix these systems?
Much thanks in advance.
Mcklsn

 

[bcastner]

You have an XP Pro system with two printers.
You have an additional XP Pro client on your LAN.
No problems with either.

You Ghost'ed an XP Home machine, and it cannot see the other two LAN workstations, nor can it use the printers offered on one of them.

=================
XP Home edition has an Administrator account. However, you need to hit F8 early and often at startup, and use Safe Mode to logon as Administrator. The password is likely empty, so just hit Enter.

1. Make sure of the Netbios settings on all machines:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/318030

2. If Windows Update is active on any machine, make sure that you use the Service Pack 2 firewall applet to permit 'File and Printer Sharing' under Exceptions

3. For specific error messages when trying to use a file share or printer, see:

http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm

4. As XP Home can only use 'Simple File Sharing', make sure under Control Panel, Folder Options, View, that both XP Pro machines have this option (nearly the last one listed) enabled or checkmarked.

5. Make sure that the XP Pro machine sharing the printers allows 'Everyone' permissions on the printers

6. See Ron Lowe and Steve Winograd's comments:

http://www.practicallynetworked.com/sharing/xp/filesharing.htm

 

[mcklsn]

Thank you very much for the suggestions. I will look at and try them all. Let me just correct a couple of things in case they make a difference. It was the XPpro system with the printers that was ghost'ed. The XPhome system was not touched in any way, but it was the one that was isolated after the disk on the XPpro system was upgraded. The two XPpro systems are have some trouble seeing some folders between them that they could see before, and some are write protected that weren't before and I can't seem to get them visible or write enabled. Does this make much difference to what you suggested?
Thanks for your help
Mcklsn

 

[bcastner]

It would be worthwhile removing the existing shares -- for folders and printers - and rebuilding them new.
Similarly, on the workstations, remove existing mappings and rebuild them new.

It is possible some security principles did not transfer.

 

[mcklsn]

Thanks again.

 

[linney]

I would truly pay a lot for a tool that would give me easy access to all the permission and security details of these systems and bypass all the XP nonsense"

If the above refers to XP Home, then I have been making use of this procedure for years (and on a small LAN) and have never had problems with it, although it is not supported by Microsoft.

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/tips/xp_home_sectab.htm

http://www.microsoft.com/ntserver/nts/downloads/recommended/scm/default.asp

This is handy too.

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_securityconsole.htm

 

[mcklsn]

I have a related question. Is there a way to set (or clear) the sharing flag for a folder and have it then apply to all the subfolders automagically. It would be great to have a tool that would let you set or clear the sharing flags for whole trees of file systems..have something like the type of UI you get with a good backup utility with boxes to check or clear by each one. It would be nice not to have to create a share name for every single folder, and then it would be nice if these folders and trees of folders were actually visible to the other systems on the LAN. Brother, what is visible to whom, when and why in the Microsoft peer-to-peer network seems to me to be pure random chance, or perhaps magic. Anyway, there ought to be a way to fairly easily go to each system and specify the sharing parameters of the whole file system without having a nervous breakdown. Comments?

 

[bcastner]

Shares already apply downlevel automaticly unless excluded specificly.

If I create a share called LevelOne on the folder \Level One and the actual directory structure is:

\Level One
\L1_Folder One
\L1_folder Two
\L1_folder Two Subfolder

Then net use G: \\bcastner\LevelOne will let me traverse all of the folders listed above.

As to listing the folder paths, Explorer will do this by expanding drive letter G:

As to listing what is shared, Computer Management, Shared Folders will do this, as will Net Share.

 

[mcklsn]

I certainly have read that the sharing automatically goes down the tree, but it doesn't seem to really happen. If you look at the sharing flags for those subfolders, they are NOT set, and when I try to go into them from another computer on the net, I get a sharing violation. It may be that I have gotten things so totally screwed up that nothing works right, but I still need a way out. A way to clear everything up. Yes, Explorer will give me the entire tree structure, but it's a several step operation at each folder to set the sharing flag, and then, as far as I can tell, it still doesn't share over the LAN. I will look at the programs you have mentioned to see if they can help with my problem. I've never heard of any of them before, so maybe one of them will do the job. Thanks very much for taking the time to help me. It really is appreciated.
Mcklsn

 

[bcastner]

If I click the Start button, Run, and type:

\\bcastner

It will return all the shares listed for the computername bcastner. (As will double clicking on bcastner in My Network Places). If in Control Panel, Folder Options, View, I have XP set to automaticly search for network shares and printers, it will also enumerate all available shares on the network.

If, following my earlier example, I double click LevelOne, it will show and allow me to use all subfolders, unless a security permission has been set on any of them to deny me access.

As to resetting things:

In XP Pro:
secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /areas FILESTORE /verbose

-or, for all values of the area parameter:
secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /verbose

See:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=313222

In XP Home:

Download subinacl.exe from:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...56-d8fe-4a91-93cf-ed6985e3927b&displaylang=en

Place the file in %windir%\system32

Then:

Start, Run, CMD
c:
cd \
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=everyone=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=system=f

 

[mcklsn]

Thank you very much. I appreciate your know-how and your patience.