XP's Network Setup Wizard broke my Home Network??

[kank]

Hello and thanks in advance for taking the time to read my post. I realize that most of the posts in this forum are tech support questions and that none of you can be expected to answer each and every post. In any case, I hope that someone might have even the smallest pointer on how I should proceed or where I should go to learn for myself. I am not a newbie, but I've never had such an apparent lack of basic connectivity before and it has me stumped.

Summary:

A family member ran XP's Network Setup Wizard on his ICS client PC in order to get his new laptop to connect to that PC for file sharing. Now, my ICS "server", running Windows 2000 Pro SP4, cannot even ping his PC or vice-versa). These computers previously worked fine sharing my dial-up internet connection and file and printer sharing worked at least partially (my Win2k computer could never access his WinXP file shares, but sharing worked fine the other direction). The fact that it worked fine before is one reason I'm so confused by it now.


Details.

1) 192.168.0.1 : Windows 2000 Professional SP4.
-My PC, which is an ICS server with shared files and printer.
-This PC can ping 127.0.0.1 and 192.168.0.1, but cannot ping 192.168.0.2 (ping request times out quickly).
-no Firewall operating

2) 192.168.0.2: Windows XP Home SP2.
-The second PC, which is an ICS client with shared files.
-This PC can ping 127.0.0.1 and 192.168.0.2, but cannot ping 192.168.0.1 (ping request times out slowly).
-Windows Firewall (ICF) has been disabled, but doesn't seem to matter. XP SP2's firewall allows file and print sharing access, anyway.


I am using a rather old 10baseT network system that consists of identical generic NIC's (PCI) and an inexpensive 4-port hub. This system has worked fine for years and I had just transferred a large file across the network a few hours before my brother ran XP's Network Setup Wizard (he did so without my knowledge and while my PC was off). The wizard changed his PC's IP address to 165.whatever (Win95-era defaults?) and altered the subnet as well. However, I changed these back and have triple-checked the addresses, computer names, and workgroup settings. I've also read some of TG's and Microsoft's articles on troubleshooting tcp/ip networks and have basically tried most every suggestion I've found, including resetting the tcp/ip stacks and even resetting winsock. Everything I read implies that I should have a basic tcp/ip connection by now (stack working on both PC's), but the PC's will not reply to each other. The NIC and hub lights are lit and everything seems to be in order. The lights blink on both cards and hub when I send out pings, but the computers do not respond. I would assume that a firewall could be the problem, but there are no firewalls operating on either machine.

I have indeed tried my best to find the solution without asking for help, but I'm running out of ideas. I greatly appreciate any suggestions or comments that anyone might have. Thanks very much.

 

[riser]

Check your workgroups. One is probably MSHOME and the other WORKGROUP.

 

[kank]

Thanks very much for the reply and suggestion. I've triple-checked the workgroups and they are identical. I simply use a "HOME" workgroup setting on all my home pc's. Yes, the XP Wizard defaults to MSHOME, but I corrected it. Even if the workgroups weren't the same, I should be able to ping the other PC's tcp/ip stack from a command line, right? The IP's are in the same octet and everything. I would guess that the workgroup wouldn't matter except for Windows itself to browse and enable file/print sharing.

My understanding is that command lines are the best way to troubleshoot basic connectivity, since Windows network browsing and file sharing access are notoriously fickle about when and where they decide to work. I don't worry too much when I can't see someone in my network neighborhood, but I do worry when I can't ping their IP from a command line.

 

[sturm]

Have you tried running the network wizard on your computer, make the disk and then run it on his. It sounds like both pcs are trying to be the ics server.

 

[kank]

Thanks for the response. No, I haven't run the network wizard on the Win2k PC, but the "client" computer is not sharing it's internet connection and in fact has no internet connection, anyway.

As an update, I'll add that I've recently added a laptop computer to the network (through CAT5, since I have no wireless router/AP yet) and now the second PC and the laptop see each other just fine and can share files, etc. It is only the Win2k PC (ICS server) that is totally out of contact. No TCP/IP ping, no nothing.

I may have to break down and run that wizard on my Win2k computer, but since it failed on the other PC's (I had to reset everything manually to get them working), I am not very keen on running it on my own PC.

I've been through every network setting available (in the GUI) on all of the computers and they are set up correctly. There are no conflicts with ICS, firewalls, protocols, IP's, etc. There is no apparent reason for this sudden breakdown in my netowrk, but the running of that network wizard was the only apparent turning point. The network worked before it was run and didn't work after. It seems to me to be the only possible suspect for this crime. What I really need to understand is what exactly that wizard does besides make sure that all computers have compatible protocols and IP's. If I can figure out what it did, maybe I can adapt to it.