Home network doesn't work/very slow. Help!

I set up a home network successfully more than a year ago and it worked
perfectly until last week.

The host is a high spec WinXP machine. It is networked to, and shares its
broadband internet connection with my older Win 98 SE machine.

Now when I try to access the internet using the Win 98 machine it loads at a
trickle...about 100 times slower than dial up. I can see the files on the
Host computer but it takes all year to try to access any files from it.

I can't see any files on the client computer from the host. I get the
message network not accessible.

Last weekend I installed Norton firewall and later uninstalled it because I
found it was very intrusive. Could it in some way have changed settings and
done this? It seems a big coicidence that it's about then that the problem
developed. I've even restored WinXP to a date before I installed Norton,
re-installed Win98 on the other computer and run network wizards on both of
them.


Gary

Gary Glencross wrote:

> I set up a home network successfully more than a year ago and it worked
> perfectly until last week.
>
> The host is a high spec WinXP machine. It is networked to, and shares its
> broadband internet connection with my older Win 98 SE machine.
>
> Now when I try to access the internet using the Win 98 machine it loads at a
> trickle...about 100 times slower than dial up. I can see the files on the
> Host computer but it takes all year to try to access any files from it.
>
> I can't see any files on the client computer from the host. I get the
> message network not accessible.
>
> Last weekend I installed Norton firewall and later uninstalled it because I
> found it was very intrusive. Could it in some way have changed settings and
> done this? It seems a big coicidence that it's about then that the problem
> developed. I've even restored WinXP to a date before I installed Norton,
> re-installed Win98 on the other computer and run network wizards on both of
> them.
>
>
> Gary
>
>


Check the hosts files and protocols on both computers, XP has its own
firewall built in I suspect some of the settings on this may have been
changed. Also try pinging both IP addrsses from both computers and the
loop back address (127.0.0.1) and also ping an internet address

Inciderntally why pay for Norton when good simple to setup less
intrusive firewalls (for example Kerio Personal Firewall or Zone
Alarm)and anti-virus (AVG) can be had for free from the net.