Wireless/Printer/Network HELP!!!

Hi,

 

Consider Dimension 8200 as computer A and Latitude D810 as Computer B.

 

1) On Computer A, Click on Start -- Run -- Cmd -- ipconfig and hit enter. It will show the ip address which will be in the format of X.X.X.X (Ip Address). Take a note of it and minimize the Command Prompt Window.

 

2) On Computer A, Start -- Right Click on My Computer Icon  -- Click on the Computer Name tab -- Take a not of the Full computer name and the workgroup name

 

3) On Computer A, Start -- Control Panel -- Network Connections -- Right Click on the icon that is active for the network (Wireless or Local Area Connection) and go into Properties -- Click on the Advanced tab -- Make sure the box for Internet Connection Firewall under Settings is unchecked. This is only for testing.

 

4) Do you have any third party firewalls (not Antivirus) like Norton Internet Security or Zone Alarm installed on this computer? If yes go ahead and turn it off. This is only for testing.

 

5) On Computer B, Follow Step 1 (Note the IP address - Y.Y.Y.Y)

 

6) On Computer B, Follow Step 2 except that instead of Computer Name tab you would see Network Identification tab.Make sure the Full computer name is different from that of Computer A and the Workgroup name is same as that of Computer A. If not go ahead and change it after clicking on the change button.

 

7) On Computer B, Follow Step 4. Step 3 is not required on computer B

 

Once you have done all the above steps, the next set of procedure is as below

 

8) On Computer A, open the Command Prompt window -- ping Y.Y.Y.Y and hit enter (Y.Y.Y.Y is the Ip Address of Computer B). Check for the result. If it comes with a Reply then the connection is fine

 

9) Follow Step 8 on Computer B -- ping X.X.X.X (X.X.X.X is the Ip address of Computer A)

 

10) If both the computers are able to ping each other, then try accessing the shared resources by going into Start -- Run -- \\ipaddress of the other computer. In other words, on Computer A, type in \\Y.Y.Y.Y and Computer B, type \\X.X.X.X . Check as to what error message you get or see if you are able to access.

 

11) Now if the Printer is shared on computer A, Computer B will be able to access Computer A's Priinter.

 

Rgds

 

Chris

Hey Best Try,

 

I gave it my "best try" and it worked after fiddling around with a few things to get the printer to print from the Latitude computer.  I do have a few more questions if you don't mind:

 

1) Prior to using your suggestions, I had already specified several folders to "share", so when I connected to the IP address of the other computer, I saw these shared folders, however I've noticed that only one or two of the items per folder is accessible where I open/use it.  I thought this was strange.  None of the files are write-protected or in use by another machine (other than the computer they're located on), any reason why this may be happening?

 

2) Is the network connection for accessing each computer by their IP address secure? I ask because I connect the computers via a wireless router, and on that router, I have setup a password for that wireless connection (where only those that know my password can connect wirelessly to the SSID), but I'm wondering if someone happened to get my IP address and entered it into their Run command or internet browser, would they then have access to my computers' files? If so, is there a way to prevent this where only my Dimension and Latitude computers can connect to each other, thus barring all other access?

 

3) Though I'm grateful for having the opportunity to print wirelessly from my laptop, is it necessary to keep my desktop computer on all the time? I rarely use that computer (except for printing), so I wondered is there a way to print directly to the printer (wireless), that doesn't require the desktop system to be on?

 

Finally, thanks a lot for your advice on getting the wireless printing up and running.  I greatly appreciate your assistance, I've been trying to get this set up for a long time, so I'm glad to finally be able to do it.