I have Windows Vista on my desktop and my brother has windows 7 stater on his laptop. I can see the desktop in the network map of the laptop (Windows 7 Starter) and can see the Laptop on my desktop but cannot explore either machine from the other. I can ping each machine from the other but no shared folders or connection between the two. I get the error message Windows cannot access \\computername Check the spelling of the name. Otherwise, there might be a problem with your network. To try and identify and resolve the problem, click Diagnose Network Discovery is on for both machines File sharing is on for both machines Public folder sharing is on for both machines Printer sharing is on for both machines Password protected sharing is off for both machines Media sharing os on for the Vista desktop machine and off for the laptop. I can connect to the Vista desktop by searching for the IP address of the vista desktop from the laptop but this only works in the result window it opens up as a result. Please help me with this. I have tried too many solutions to list them all here but none of them allow the machines to communicate.

Hi, Thanks for posting! First of all, please disable your securify software such as Firewall or antivirus software and turn on Windows firewall to check the result. What is the error message saying exactly? Please try the following steps to troubleshoot: 1. Verify that You're Using NTFS on Your Hard Drives 2. Ensure that File and Printer Sharing Is Enabled Open the Network and Sharing Center and click the Manage network connections link on the left pane. Then right-click the network connection and select Properties. 3. Disable the Sharing Wizard Open Computer. Click Tools and select Folder Options. If you don't see the file menu, press the Alt key. Click the View tab. Scroll down and uncheck Use Sharing Wizard (in Vista or Windows 7) Click OK to save the changes. 4. Verify that Everyone Is on the Same Workgroup On home and small business networks, computers must be assigned to a Workgroup. You should have all the computers that you want to share with each other set to the same group. Regards, Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.