HomeGroup not working - folders visible but cant open them
Hello, I have windows 7 RTM on three machines. I joined all of them to a homegroup, which was working for a few hours. Now, I can see the other members in the group, I can expand them to see their shared folders, but I cannot open them. Also, the icons used to be based on the type of folder, like a video for the video folder that was shared. Now, all of the icons are the generic blue win7 library icon.I have left the homegroup, tried making it again, and rejoining them all, still the same issues. All of them seem to join fine, but none of the computers can share files.Any ideas?
October 4th, 2009 10:19am

Hi, Please refer to the following steps to troubleshoot the issue. Step 1: Modify HomeGroup settings. ========================= 1. Click Start menu and open Control Panel. 2. Click "Network and Sharing Center" and click "Change advanced sharing settings" in the left panel. 3. In current "Home or Work" profile, please select "Turn off password protected sharing" option and "Allow Windows to manage homegroup connections (recommended)" options, and then click "Save changes" button. Step 2: Temporarily turn off firewall on each machine and router (if it has) for a test. Step 3: Access the target computer directly ========================= 1. Boot computer A. 2. Click the Start Button on computer A, type "cmd" (without quotation marks), in the search result list, right click on Cmd.exe and select Run as administrator. Note: If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type your password, or click Continue. 3. In the popup window, type: "ipconfig" (without quotation marks) and press Enter. 4. Remember the IP address such as "192.168.XXX.XXX". 5. Boot Computer B to Desktop. 6. Click the Start Button on computer B, type "\\<IP address of the target computer A>" (without quotation marks) and press "OK". For example: \\192.168.XXX.XXX Can we access the shared folder on computer A successfully? If there is any error information, please capture the picture and upload it to SkyDrive ( www.skydrive.live.com ), and then share it to me. Thanks, Novak
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October 5th, 2009 10:39am

I have tried everything and have the same problem, I can see the homegroup on my laptop but cannot open the folders. On the other laptop, it shows no homegroup available. I have disabled the firewalls, confirmed identical IP addresses, both on home networks...any help would be greatly appreciated!
February 7th, 2011 10:13pm

Novak Wu, After 3 days of trying everything to join my PC and Laptop together, your solution for the IP address work just fine. Thanks. However, can you tell me why witin my homegroup I was able to see the folders but unable to open them?? Thanks again.
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June 27th, 2011 7:24pm

hi ppl, I can't connect using my two win7 home premium laptops. I used homegroup networking, I saw both laptops are connected to each other but I can't see the shared folders. The two laptop say, " Windows can not access\\LAPTOP" Check the spelling of the name, there might be the problem of your network. Please help. I did already what Novak Wu said but still not working. Thanks
June 29th, 2011 8:30pm

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