Srsly.

All day, I've been trying to network a Vista Desktop PC to a XP Laptop. I had problems with having to re-assign the IP address of a printer, change the IP address of the laptop, once the two PC's finally realised they were connected I had to convince the XP laptop that it could go on the internet. That last part solved itself.

The current problem is that Vista works on the basis of "Public" folders, not normal "shared folders". I've transferred Documents from the My Documents of the Vista PC, to it's Public folders. The public folders can be viewed and accessed on the XP laptop. I managed to copy and paste the folders from the public folders onto the laptop.

I then took a break, watched House MD, turned off the laptop.

I came back to it and effectively, NEITHER PC, has the permission to delete the files from the Public folder. Meaning, I've got even more documents taking up space on my HD. It also won't let me put anything new in that folder. So the documents are all stuck in stasis.

How would I be able to set permissions to allow both PC's to be able to delete the folders? I've tried messing around with everything, but I'm really at the end of my tether.

Any suggestions?

How would I be able to set permissions to allow both PC's to be able to delete the folders? I've tried messing around with everything, but I'm really at the end of my tether.

Any suggestions?

Reformat the HD and install XP?

:p


Is there not an option in Vista, as an admin, where you can change the ownership rights of a specific folder, like you can in OSX (can set who has read, write and read & write access to each folder/file)?

Remind me to never get a laptop, they seem to be absurdly hard to network.

Is there not an option in Vista, as an admin, where you can change the ownership rights of a specific folder, like you can in OSX (can set who has read, write and read & write access to each folder/file)?Yup, although the Public folder is special so it's always public.

Here's a handy diagram: (all this on the Vista computer)
http://img371.imageshack.us/img371/9745/networkyya0.png
In Control Panel > Network and Sharing Center:
- Make sure your Network is set to Private (if it's a home network), you can change that with the Customize button. (Public networks have more limited features)
- Make sure File Sharing is set to On (yes Vista still supports Shared Folders, just check the Sharing tab in a folder's properties)
- Make sure Public File Sharing is set to On ("Turn on sharing so anyone with network access can open, change and delete files")

In Control Panel > System:
- Make sure both computers are on the same workgroup (same name). XP defaults to MSHOME and Vista defaults to WORKGROUP so this is a pretty common source of problems.

Reformat the HD and install XP?

:p


Is there not an option in Vista, as an admin, where you can change the ownership rights of a specific folder, like you can in OSX (can set who has read, write and read & write access to each folder/file)?vista has all the options you could want in an OS, really. they're just all buried in horrible UIs and nonsense restrictions. as sup shows, it's entirely possible, but where it SHOULD be defaulted like that, or at least easy to flip a button and change, you have to jump through hoops to get it done.

it's what made everyone say vista was so horrible in the beginning and why people are reluctant to change even now. file sharing is an especially large nightmare in vista. regardless of how you accomplish it.

Q: Filesharing?
A: Router and FTP server!

It surprises me how simple file sharing on a Mac is compared to Vista... it takes less than a minute to set it up for two computers which have never fileshared before.

And I imagine on Vista you'll get the security centre popping up constantly saying "Are you sure you want to open this file on X computer", "Are you sure you want to copy this file from X computer to your computer", "Are you sure you want to close this file from X computer", "Are you sure you want to destroy Vista with a hammer?"

I've never had the need for filesharing over a network anyways, it's painfully slow.

We do it all the time at home - fastest way. All our computers have 10/100/1000 ethernet cards (gigabit cards, 1Gbps), so you just hook a network cable (must be crossover if you're dealing with windows machines) between the two computers and you have stupidly fast file transfers. Bear in mind USB2 and Firewire 400 are around 400Mbps and Firewire 800 is only 800Mbps. Sends gigabytes of data in pretty much no time at all.

Q: Do I need a crossover cable if I use a router?
A: No, most routers can handle any network cables, crossed-over or not.

Most "home-spec" routers are only 100Mbit though, so to get the full benefits of the gigabit card you have to connect the computers direct to each other via a crossover cable.

Cheers for the tech support. I haven't had time to have a go at your method yet but thanks anyway.