Can't See a Computer on the Network

[Superguy]

On a Win XP network, I cannot see the shares on a particular computer. Lets call it SMITH.


SMITH has XP sp2 and some of the firewall setting are enabled.

SMITH has a static ip and can be pinged by name and ip.

SMITH can see other shares on the network.

SMITH cannot be access on the network by running \\smith or browsing the network.

Any ideas? Any firewall setting to enable/disable?

[ecross]

If any of the computers have the Windows Firewall enabled, make sure it is properly configured for file and printer sharing. With Windows Firewall enabled, go to the Exception tab, and click to check the File and Printer Sharing checkbox.

If you've installed a third party firewall program (Norton, McAfee, PC-cillin, eTrust, ZoneAlarm, etc), make sure that it's configured to allow access on the local area network.

And Superguy please try and not doublepost. I had to remove the other one so we can keep this into one post so we are not answering questions in two different threads. It get's confusing when helping others.

[Superguy]

Sorry, didn't realize about the double post.

File and Printing is setup as an exception.

What do you think about the weird ping address?

[ecross]

Try it again and let's see the results. Open the command prompt and type ping <computer name>. For example, you'll type:

ping Superguy and you should get a reply from a private ip address on the local area network.

[Superguy]

No luck. Still getting an external ip.

Pinging premium3.geo.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.234.35] with

Reply from 68.142.234.35: bytes=32 time=15ms TTL=54
Reply from 68.142.234.35: bytes=32 time=16ms TTL=53
Reply from 68.142.234.35: bytes=32 time=15ms TTL=53
Reply from 68.142.234.35: bytes=32 time=18ms TTL=53

Ping statistics for 68.142.234.35:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 15ms, Maximum = 18ms, Average = 16ms

This is the response I'm getting for 'ping smith'.

[ecross]

How are your computer's configured for the local area network? Explain the network setup.

[Superguy]

It's a peer to peer with about 8 computers and this is the only one pinging to the external ip.

There is a NetGear router set as the dhcp server attached to a cable modem with a dynamic ip.

The local ip's are set to 192.168.17.xxx

[Superguy]

Just an update. Pinging any internal host name takes me to an external ip.

Moreover. Pinging random names/letters also returns an external ip.


Pinging premium3.geo.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.234.xxx

where xxx varies.

[Tuttle]

What's the output from "ipconfig /all" at a command prompt?

Have you had any spyware-type issues on this machine in the past?

[Superguy]

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : Smith
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Intel(R) PRO/100 VE Network Connecti
on
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-07-E9-47-D7-F7
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.17.105
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.17.1
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 167.206.3.207
167.206.3.141

This is what i get from ipconfig /all

For some reason, when pinging SMITH from another pc i get the correct ip.

MS Spyware was installed. No spyware.

What else can i check?

[Superguy]

Looks like the user was using Norton and it updated some filters and turned off access to certain ports. Another update and some tweaking fixed it up.

It still does not explain the weird pinging.

Anyone know what would cause those external ip's to show up?

[Tuttle]

You're pointing to external DNS servers (which isn't a bad thing -- the DNS caches in some routers are kinda flaky). The downside to doing that is that the ISP's DNS servers aren't going to let your machines register themselves in DNS, so "ping smith" isn't going to work.

What Windows will do by default however, is when it can't find "smith" it will try some sensible guesses based on the domain name it thinks your PC has. If you want to try and work out how it's coming to that Akamai address, go into Control Panel | Network Connections, right-click on Local Area Connection, click Properties, double-click Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), click Advanced and go to the DNS tab. What is all the DNS suffix stuff set to?