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Trouble with Win7 randomly blocking inbound XP connection / file sharing

Tags:
  • Networking
  • Windows XP
  • Computers
  • Connection
  • Windows 7
October 17, 2014 4:09:39 AM

Hi all - long time reader, first time poster. I am responsible for maintaining a ship-board LAN onboard a sailing research vessel and I'm encountering an issue where two of the Win7 computers on the network will randomly "block" inbound communication from all XP computers (and only XP computers) on the ship a couple times a day - I receive a notice that the "resource is not available or I may not have permission, etc etc". All computers will see the shared folders fine then, out of nowhere, all XP machines will not be able to access win7 machines. The only way to restore the connection / sharing capability is to restart the Win7 computer doing the blocking. I've done some troubleshooting and tinkering with settings to no avail (detailed below).

The network made up of 8 computers in various places around the ship as well as a wireless network to allow for laptop connection. Here are the details of the network, as well as some troubleshooting steps I’ve taken and related info:

The computers (pardon the names – they refer to locations on the ship) on the network are a mix of Win7 and XP and are wired to 2 Netgear FS 524S switches. Four of the computers are behind a “physical” firewall (see below), which allows them to see / access shared folders on the network, but doesn't allow other CPUs to access them.
__________________
Lib1 – Win7
Lib2 – Win7
AftCabin – XP
DogNav – XP

----“physical” firewall---
Labutil – XP
CHIRP – Win7
ADCP – XP
DataLogger – Win7
__________________

Other info:

- All computers have static IP addresses (TCP IPv4).
- Also wireless to network to allow laptop connectivity, although this is seldom used (and most often by a Mac accessing the network - though there doesn't seem to be a direct correlation with the "blocking" instances).
- All network settings look right (sharing / network discovery enabled, no password protection, enable file sharing for devices using 40 or 56 bit encryption, etc).

The issue in detail:

Lib1 & Lib2 are constantly (and randomly) “blocking” inbound communication / file sharing from all the XP machines once or twice per day. Other Win7 machines (CHIRP & DataLogger as well as the other “Lib” computer) can still see / access shared folders from the misbehaving computer and all computers / shared folders on the network can still be seen / accessed from the misbehaving machine( including XP computers). Oddly enough, I am able to ping the misbehaving computer from an XP machine that is blocked.

All the computers behind the firewall seem to communicate with each other with no problem (i.e., I haven’t noted any “blocking” instances). I tried ensuring the settings are the same on these computers as on the lib1/2 computers, but this did not help.

Troubleshooting so far: I have disabled any and all windows firewall and security rules that may be interfering. I’ve also disabled all Symantec network protection on Lib2, but this has not alleviated the issue (the network protection logs are empty). I’ve gone so far as to completely disable Symantec, but the problem persists.

I’ve ensured all computers are operating in the same “workgroup” (SEA_NT), as recommended by the help topic on networking computers with different O/S.

I have only noted one computer at a time “blocking”, so when Lib1 is inaccessible from an XP machine, Lib2 is still accessible.

The issue does not seem to be hardware or network switch related, as some computers can still communicate with XP-blocking machines.

Any thoughts?

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