Windows

Vista works virtually the same as XP for file sharing, they just have this wizard that makes it different.

If you join both to the same workgroup[not the default workgroup] then share the resources, assign permissions to users or a group of users, this works about like XP did.

The big different is the default public folder sharing which is my documents, my music and some other whatnot.

Thanks CG.

Unfortunately, this did NOT work on my new Vista systems. No matter how I setup the folders, users and permissions, "Access Denied" is all I get. I get NO popup dialog box asking for a valid User ID and password. In XP, I DID get that dialog box and could enter the Administrators ID and password for the system Iwas accessing and it allowed the non-sdministrative user on my PC to see and access shared folders on the other system. Using EVERYONE at least allows me access.

How do I get Vista to do what my old XP systems did?

Thanks.

for sharing stuff on a home network. It shares out public folders like my documents, my music and supposedly you don't have to join workgroups and the lot. While your running Vista, 7 is really close on how all this works.

Is network discovery, file/folder sharing enabled in Network and Sharing Center ?[not public folder sharing] and are the network connections private? [public networks block most stuff and this is one of the peeves I have with Network and Sharing Center. If your connections are listed as public, change em to private. ]

These wizards do a lot like configuring the firewall automatically and Windows Firewall with Enhanced Security can be a pain...

What I've done is join the comps to the same workgroup [requires reboot], enable network discovery, and file and folder sharing. Share out the folder and assign permissions making sure that user accounts that will access the shares are on every comp.

Agree with you and tried all that.

Maybe a different look at the problem is in order.

1. Computer A has one user only - Alice (Administrator).
2. Computer B has one Standard User - Bill and a locked, unused Adminstrative user (default Adminstrator when system first started).
3. Both computers have Everyone with full-control - both users can see and access folders on other computer.
4. WITHOUT Everyone - Alice can see Bills folders BUT cannot access them.
5. Bill CANNOT see or access anything on Alice's computer.
6. I do NOT want to setup Bill on Alice's computer to allow him to access folders on it. When Bill clicks on Alice's computer in Networking, I want a login dialog box to pop up so Bill can enter Alice's ID and password that will allow Bill to see and access shared folders on Alice's computer. This it how it worked for me in Windows XP. Vista won't pop up the login box ... it just "Denied Access".

This problem caused such headaches for Microsoft, they had to go back to the drawing board and build Windows 7 to undo all the **** in Vista causing all the problems.

I an NOT paying twice for an OS that should have worked in the first place. Windows Me all over again and we get stiffed!

If you don't require logon, try setting the machines to require logon. This should require a logon prompt for everything anyone does that isn't a local machine user.