Dual boot networking puzzle.

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I have just installed an ADSL modem/router for a friend, who is running an XP
PC and a Vista PC and everything works on the resultant network. As ever,
firewall settings were at the root of most of the problems. So I know from
personal experience (and from reading some of the threads in this group) that
a mixed OS network, including Vista, can work. Now, consider this:

I have a dual-boot desktop PC with three hard drives XP-SP2 Home on C:,
Vista Home Premium on D: and the third drive E: reserved mainly for
multimedia file storage. I also have a laptop, running XP-SP2 Home, which
handles all the day to day routine workload. Both machines are connected to
an ADSL modem/router, the laptop by wireless and the PC by Ethernet. The
dual-boot setup ensures that the drive holding the currently active OS is
always designated 'C:'. I thought this was rather a neat feature at first and
it suits me fine, but it sure as Hell confuses the network. In XP mode
everything is fine and 2-way communication between the PC and the laptop and
the Internet works perfectly. When the PC is in Vista mode, however, the
laptop cannot see the shared drives or any shared folders on the PC, but
there is no problem at the PC end and it has full access to the laptop's C:
drive and Internet. I think it is obvious that while I can cope with D:
becoming C: and C: becoming D: when switching from XP mode to Vista mode the
network can't. Does anyone know of a way round this or should I give in and
drop the 'neat' feature?

The Workgroup name is MSHOME on both machines and in both modes. The
computer name on the dual-boot machine is obviously the same in both modes
but I cannot use the same share name for the two 'C:' drives, if you follow
me. Is this the problem?

There are some in this discussion group who may be interested to know that
as a temporary measure I used a crossover cable and ICS on my friend's
machines to allow the new Vista machine access to the Internet. No problems
once the firewall settings had been sorted.
 
I doubt that the drive letter switching has anything to do with it. Shares on
a network are (or at least should be) designated via a universal naming
convention consisting of the name of the host machine and the name of the
share, as in --

\\host\share

-- so the drive letter just doesn't enter into it. I'm thinking maybe the
way that Vista shares files being different from the way WinXP does it may be
what's causing your issue? Vista doesn't use Simple File Sharing the way the
WinXP does. You might look into that.

Also, considering the fact that you're dual booting Vista and WinXP, I hope
you're aware of the Shadow File Copy issues invovled in such an arrangement.
WinXP's system restore doesn't play nicely with Vista's.

Hope you find a solution!
 
Thanks for that helpful reply. I had hoped that the share name was the key
here and not the drive letter and this morning made sure that the share names
in XP and Vista are the same. Now I have achieved a breakthrough and can see
and open three drives on the PC in Vista mode from the XP laptop. I
share-named the Vista drive "Vista" and the XP drive "XP". Unfortunately the
share names "\\Main\Vista" and "\\Main\XP" both open the same physical drive,
the XP drive. There must be a logical explanation for this, but for the
moment I cannot see it.

Thanks again for your comments and I will follow your suggestions.
 
I'm somewhat confused about the exact configuration of your dual boot system,
so I'm not able to offer a specific suggestion. It may be helpful to be sure
you keep separate the idea of a drive name and a system name. The "drive"
name itself should not matter, unless you are sharing the entire drive
(something I really wouldn't recommend for a system drive).

Are you saying that in both Windows XP and in Windows Vista the system has
the name "Main", and that the share is "share"? If so, then I wouldn't
understand why you were seeing the issue you're seeing. But if the situation
is something else, then the most precise description you can give of that
configuration in both operating systems may be helpful in providing the
information someone needs to help you along a little bit more.
 
Update on last posting:

The logical explanation is that in my trial and error efforts at getting
shared drives to display on the network I had unwittingly given each drive
more than one share name. Once I realised this and corrected it everything
dropped into place.
 
OUT-cotton-pickin'-STANDING!

Congratulations!

AliGator said:
Update on last posting:

The logical explanation is that in my trial and error efforts at getting
shared drives to display on the network I had unwittingly given each drive
more than one share name. Once I realised this and corrected it everything
dropped into place.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks jimmuh.

For the record I ended up using different share names in Vista and XP, but
will experiment with common share names. Security-wise I am the sole user of
both machines on my home network and find it easier to find things if all
drives are fully shared.
 
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