Home Network- Syncing files?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bob Hobden
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Bob Hobden

I have a....
PC running Window XP Home. 1Gb ram. 250Gb HD connected via Ethernet cable to
a broadband wireless router
and a Laptop running Windows Vista Home Premium. 2Gb ram. 130Gb HD connected
by wireless.

I've set up the Network and both can use the printer attached to the PC and
both can see each others "My Documents" but I can't find how I can get them
to sync "My Documents" so I can work on either to change etc files on both.
Anyone know if/how this can be done?

Seems it might be easy if both were running Vista but I don't want to
upgrade the PC.

Regards
Bob H
 
"Bob Hobden" wrote
I have a....
PC running Window XP Home. 1Gb ram. 250Gb HD connected via Ethernet cable
to a broadband wireless router
and a Laptop running Windows Vista Home Premium. 2Gb ram. 130Gb HD
connected by wireless.

I've set up the Network and both can use the printer attached to the PC
and both can see each others "My Documents" but I can't find how I can get
them to sync "My Documents" so I can work on either to change etc files on
both.
Anyone know if/how this can be done?

Seems it might be easy if both were running Vista but I don't want to
upgrade the PC.
Click to expand...

Seeing as nobody has replied perhaps I had better tell what I've found with
a little help from a friend...

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/prophoto/synctoy.mspx

A small free program from Microsoft called "SyncToy" that does exactly what
I wanted to do. Sync file between my Vista Laptop and my XP PC. It doesn't
just work for digital photos it works for all files as far as I can see.
 
I have an almost identical set-up to Bob Hobden's xcept that my laptop uses
Vista Home Basic. My problem is that I can not see any files or documents on
the laptop from my pc when I open "My Network Places", whereas from the
laptop I can access all files on the pc. The other problem is that although I
can use from the laptop the printer connected to the pc, I have to wait
minutes (!) before the printer is "ready".

The laptop has Symantec Internet Security and disabling that does not help.
I never had such problems when I used a laptop running XP!!!
 
I posted this before but am not sure if it got sent. I have the same set-up
as Bob's but my problem is that, whereas my Vista laptop sees the files and
printer on my XP pc, the converse is not true: no laptop files appear in "My
Network Places" on my pc.
Also it takes minutes (!) for the printer to respond.
 
"NickR" wrote ...
I have an almost identical set-up to Bob Hobden's xcept that my laptop uses
Vista Home Basic. My problem is that I can not see any files or documents
on
the laptop from my pc when I open "My Network Places", whereas from the
laptop I can access all files on the pc. The other problem is that
although I
can use from the laptop the printer connected to the pc, I have to wait
minutes (!) before the printer is "ready".

The laptop has Symantec Internet Security and disabling that does not
help.
I never had such problems when I used a laptop running XP!!!
Click to expand...

Nick, is the " My Docs" file on the laptop "Public"? It has to be. I must
admit my printer reacts quickly to input from the laptop so I don't know
what that problem is although I did load the driver for the printer on the
laptop.
 
Thanks for the suggestion Bob. I actually suspected that that was at the
route of my problem but don't know how to fix it. On XP it is as easy as what
you write. But in Vista when I look at "Properties" of Documents and then
"Security" I get a list of Greoup of user names that includes me, SYSTEM and
Administrators, all with full permissions. I can see no way that I can make
the Directory public with Read Only privileges. Do you have a hint?
 
Following up on what I wrote earlier, I managed to find some help on
windowshelp.microsoft.com. What i did not notice is that when you are looking
at the folder list and you click on one of them, a "Share" button appears in
the toolbar. By clicking on that you should be able to share your
file/folders with others. It does not work quite like it is described by MS
and, for example, when I click on Share in the File Sharing window it
declares that the folder is now shared, but when I click on "Show me the
files I am sharing" I get nil ! Well at least, I can now see a laptop folder
in "My Netwrok Places" of my pc, but it is empty :-)
 
Following up on what I wrote earlier, I managed to find some help on
windowshelp.microsoft.com. What i did not notice is that when you are
looking
at the folder list and you click on one of them, a "Share" button appears
in
the toolbar. By clicking on that you should be able to share your
file/folders with others. It does not work quite like it is described by
MS
and, for example, when I click on Share in the File Sharing window it
declares that the folder is now shared, but when I click on "Show me the
files I am sharing" I get nil ! Well at least, I can now see a laptop
folder
in "My Netwrok Places" of my pc, but it is empty :-)
Click to expand...
You need to get the "Docs" file of your Laptop showing on your PC via the
Network folder and then use "Map Network Drive" on your PC to give it a
drive letter on your PC (Probably will be Y ) then use the program I
suggested for the files you want to sync within the drives on both
computers. If you try to sync all of your docs it will take some time and
some rubbish will flow around, like the examples from Microsoft, so from
experience it's best to choose the few that are important to keep in sync.
For me that was the "Family Tree.paf" file and will be My Photos idc.
It worked for me... eventually!. :-)
 
Yes I now do have my Docs file showing in My Network Places on my pc.
However,when I click on it , I get a "permission denied" message. And yet the
sharing window that "Everyone" has reading privileges.
I checked the help on the MS Networks web page but it is not very helpful
since the features which they describe for the "Share" window are simply not
there.
Nick
 
"NickR" wrote
Yes I now do have my Docs file showing in My Network Places on my pc.
However,when I click on it , I get a "permission denied" message. And yet
the
sharing window that "Everyone" has reading privileges.
I checked the help on the MS Networks web page but it is not very helpful
since the features which they describe for the "Share" window are simply
not
there.
Click to expand...

Not some password protection on that drive is there?

Have you gone to "Tools" and then "Map Network Drives" and tried to give
that drive a drive letter?
Once you get that you can use the program I suggested originally.
 
No paassword protection that I can see. I trie mapping a network drive with
the same result - permission denied. The other funny thing is that the
documents on my laptop which I want to access from my pc appear in the "My
Network Places" even when the laptop is turned off. That should not be or,
at least, that did not happen with my old laptop which ran XP :-)
 
A guy at the PC Advisor work group on Networking lead me to a solutions. It
simply required clicking on the "Share" button on the toolbar and then adding
"Everyone" to the list of users/groups that had "read" privileges on that
file. Voila! No mapping of network drives and such.
 
"NickR" wrote
A guy at the PC Advisor work group on Networking lead me to a solutions. It
simply required clicking on the "Share" button on the toolbar and then
adding
"Everyone" to the list of users/groups that had "read" privileges on that
file. Voila! No mapping of network drives and such.
Click to expand...
That is OK if you just want to share, I wanted to Sync the files on both
mine so they both sang from the same hymn sheet.
 
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