[csvencer]

I have read through most of the setup guides, FAQ's, etc and still have not found a solid solution for my issue.


I currently have setup a WAN with one desktop that is running 95% of the time as the Network Storage. I have a 500gb drive in it that is partitioned with the second half setup as network storage and that drive is shared for the rest of the house, ie music, pictures, etc. Now I have another computer hooked up to the LCD in the living room that I want a SOLID connection to the other computer but that is always an issue. From it not finding the computer on the network to skipping music once it has found it. I have plenty of signal strength, plenty of processing power, and a good router to send all the data. The storage "server" is hooked directly into the WRT54GS via LAN so there is only one wireless connection to slow this all down and yet it still gives me an issue. How can I setup that second partition as a consistent storage server for the rest of the house so that I am not continously fighting to get everything to connect to it?


Specs:

office computer

winXP PRO, 3ghz, 1 gig, LAN to the 54gs

Living Room

XP Home, 2.8ghz, 1 gig, WAN


Any help would be much appreciated.


Thanks.


-Svence

__________________

 

[redondoman]

I'm not sure if I'm truly understanding your problem. Even though your wireless card is showing full signal you may still have interference. If you can't run Cat 5, try these:

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-PLK200...p_ob_e_title_2

 

[mjfink]

I'm not sure if I understand the question. But I recently purchased a wireless router/bridge from DLink that works on the 5GHZ band, which, in my (limited) experience, seems to be MUCH more reliable for speed. I get about 200 mb/s as a normal connection speed, with NO drops at all (including during playback for BD rips). If that the type of thing that you are trying to fix, I would suggest getting a 5GHZ router and network card (or bridge), I'm very happy with my configuration.

 

[walford]

Also if you are posssibly haveing interference try changing the default wireless channel number to channel 1 or channel 11.

 

[csvencer]

Thanks for the ideas. Sorry for not being so clear, its just that I feel like I should be able to get a reliable connection and network and I keep getting hiccups in the system. I would rather not have to run Cat 5 cables to the living room but if this doesn't get sorted out I might. As far as going with a 5ghz router, thats a possibility but would cost me some bucks if I needed a new router and new card for the living room.


I guess was just hoping there was some way I could enable a smoother connection between the two without having to rework the entire system.


What is everyone running on there servers? I know some of you have a huge NAS setup stashed in the basement and access it remotely, what are you running on the server end?


-Svence

 

[HappyFunBoater]

Svence,


When you say you can't find the other computer on the network, does the problem go away eventually? Or do you have to do something?


How are you trying to access the other computer? Via a shared folder? Or an admin share, like F$? Or an IP address?

 

[csvencer]

When it can't find it I usually have to either restart or go to the office and send a file to the living room. The office can almost always find the living rooms shared folders on the network and once I send something from the office to the living room I can go back out to the LR and it will see the office. I haven't tried pinging it when I can't seem to find it, I will give that a shot once I have the issue again.


Also any ideas as to why I can't seem to even stream MP3s from one room to the other without studders? I have full signal strength on the wireless network and the other computer is wired via cat5.


-Svence

 

[ams123]



Quote:
Originally Posted by csvencer /forum/post/15449365


When it can't find it I usually have to either restart or go to the office and send a file to the living room. The office can almost always find the living rooms shared folders on the network and once I send something from the office to the living room I can go back out to the LR and it will see the office. I haven't tried pinging it when I can't seem to find it, I will give that a shot once I have the issue again.


Also any ideas as to why I can't seem to even stream MP3s from one room to the other without studders? I have full signal strength on the wireless network and the other computer is wired via cat5.


-Svence

Not sure if this will help but I had a similar problem finding shared drives on my home network. Try mapping the network drive to you computer and than use the mapped network drive in whatever tool you are using to find your media. I have found this to be much more reliable between my XP and Vista machines.

 

[HappyFunBoater]



Quote:
Originally Posted by csvencer /forum/post/15449365


When it can't find it I usually have to either restart or go to the office and send a file to the living room. The office can almost always find the living rooms shared folders on the network and once I send something from the office to the living room I can go back out to the LR and it will see the office. I haven't tried pinging it when I can't seem to find it, I will give that a shot once I have the issue again.


Also any ideas as to why I can't seem to even stream MP3s from one room to the other without studders? I have full signal strength on the wireless network and the other computer is wired via cat5.


-Svence

I used to have problems finding a machine by "name". The problem would come and go. But I could always access that same machine by its IP address. I did some searches on the web and found that it was a common problem. It had something to do with Windows name tables, who was the master table owner, whether all the other computers knew who the master was, etc. (Sorry, I may be butchering the terminology.) I ended up turning off DHCP and assigning each machine a unique name in the hosts file. I've never had a problem finding a machine since then. I don't know if this is your problem, but it sounds similar.


As far as the stuttering MP3s when transferring wirelessly, are there any logs, etc., in the wireless AP that may give a clue?

 

[mjfink]

This is always a good idea, it's not going to hurt, and can help in many cases.


Using a "hosts" file will make name resolution instantenous, and will fix lots of stupid "hang" problems when trying to access computers by \\\\computername\\sharename.


Just put a "hosts" file on each machine and put in the IPs of all the other computer. Tell the router to reserve the IP addresses for each particular machine (so that they always have the same IP addresses).


May not fix your problem, but will probably resolve other slowness issues you may experience when working with networked computers.

Quote:
Originally Posted by HappyFunBoater /forum/post/15449892


I used to have problems finding a machine by "name". The problem would come and go. But I could always access that same machine by its IP address. I did some searches on the web and found that it was a common problem. It had something to do with Windows name tables, who was the master table owner, whether all the other computers knew who the master was, etc. (Sorry, I may be butchering the terminology.) I ended up turning off DHCP and assigning each machine a unique name in the hosts file. I've never had a problem finding a machine since then. I don't know if this is your problem, but it sounds similar.


As far as the stuttering MP3s when transferring wirelessly, are there any logs, etc., in the wireless AP that may give a clue?

 

[csvencer]

Well I mapped the shared folders as drives and that seems to have them connected pretty consistently now. I am still having the stuttering issue though, not sure what the deal is.


-Svence