Desktop and Laptop lose sharing

Try3 said:

What about the script that I posted?

Denis

My apologies. I completely overlooked your idea for no reason than scanning replies too quickly. My bad.

I last constructed a batch file in the Dos 2.? days and have no confidence that I could do so right now. However, I did go to Device Manager, opened Network Adapters, right clicked on "Dell Wireless 1820a 80211.ac", clicked on disable, waited a moment, and clicked on enable; the network connection disappeared from the list of wireless networks and then it re-appeared when I clicked on enable. But the missing Desktop did not appear in File Explorer.

By the way, restarting the laptop will not cause the network connection to the desktop to re-appear.

Yes, I (very carefully) set up my network as in that Youtube video.

One of my replies was unclear; it is true that re-starting the laptop does not restore the connection of the laptop to the desktop. The way to reliably restore the connection between the two computers is to restart each at the same time. Then both computers appear in File Explorer on each machine.

One question I still have, if the computers have lost the connection between the two, why during that unconnected condition can I print from the laptop to the printer connected to the desktop?

Try3 said:

Your strange mix of symptoms make me think of a firewall or router problem.

1 Have you ever had another anti-malware or firewall application on this computer?

2 What info does you router provide about what it is allowing or blocking?

3 If you find where the router provides IP addresses of connected computers, try putting them into the File explorer address bar during a problem state along with preceding \\ and trailing \ then the name of one of the shared folders - so something like

\\192.168.2.101\SharedDocs



Denis

1) I Use malwarebytes free, windows defender, and the windows firewall on each computer. Both computers came with some "free" antivirus and security software, which I promptly uninstalled.

2) I use MAC filtering at the router, but have had no issues with that. Both the computers I've talked about here are allowed by their MAC addresses to connect, and both are shown to be connected to the router (when they are not asleep).

My router allows blocking by site and services, but both are set to never.

3) Now this experiment was interesting. While neither other networked computer was shown as connected to the other in their File Explorer, I did as you suggested and put the numeric address of the other computer and name of the shared file in the address line. BOTH computers would connect to the other. Both could read a file in the shared folder on the other computer. Both are (for now) shown as in the network, showing for a name their numeric address. I could just assign a static address to each one of the computers concerned, and use the pull down menu at the address line to quickly re-connect. But maybe there is a more elegant solution? Note: While the network numeric names appear, it is not in the normal way. In the Navigation Pane, normally under one Network listing are the names of the other computers that are connected to the same network. When I connected with the using the numeric address of the other computer, Network was listed twice in the navigation pane. The name of the computer displaying the file explorer was listed under one Network, and the numeric address of the other computer was listed under another Network heading. Like the two computers are connected on different networks ??

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abacus said:

....
3) Now this experiment was interesting. While neither other networked computer was shown as connected to the other in their File Explorer, I did as you suggested and put the numeric address of the other computer and name of the shared file in the address line. BOTH computers would connect to the other. Both could read a file in the shared folder on the other computer. Both are (for now) shown as in the network, showing for a name their numeric address. I could just assign a static address to each one of the computers concerned, and use the pull down menu at the address line to quickly re-connect. But maybe there is a more elegant solution? Note: While the network numeric names appear, it is not in the normal way. In the Navigation Pane, normally under one Network listing are the names of the other computers that are connected to the same network. When I connected with the using the numeric address of the other computer, Network was listed twice in the navigation pane. The name of the computer displaying the file explorer was listed under one Network, and the numeric address of the other computer was listed under another Network heading. Like the two computers are connected on different networks ??

I later found that only the first time on each computer that I connected with the numeric address of the other computer did the network numeric address appear under a separate Network heading. From then on, there was only one Network heading in File Explorer for both connected computers. Beats me...

According to your laptop model, I found that driver site: https://www.dell.com/support/home/us...laptop/drivers Use your Service Tag to see drivers for your specific model. If your Wi-Fi is Dell Wireless 1820A, then this is the direct link: https://dl.dell.com/FOLDER04610897M/..._SETUP_ZPE.exe I would also update the Bluetooth because it is the same chip and maybe related. Direct link: https://dl.dell.com/FOLDER05568458M/..._setup_ZPE.exe

The WiFi driver was up to date. The Bluetooth driver was 12.0.1.720, so I did update it to the newest 12.0.1.1105. The bluetooth driver installed without problem.

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As fully discussed below, my two computers, a laptop and a desktop, connect by a Windows network for file and printer sharing. Often the two computers are not shown as being connected by the network in file explorer. But, by entering the numeric address of the other computer into the file explorer search field, either will connect with the other. And also, I discovered, I can enter the name of the other computer (as if one computer were named DESKTOP and the other LAPTOP). So it seems that all the network functionality is actually working except for File Explorer actually listing the names of the connected computer in its displays.

abacus said:

3) Now this experiment was interesting. While neither other networked computer was shown as connected to the other in their File Explorer, I did as you suggested and put the numeric address of the other computer and name of the shared file in the address line. BOTH computers would connect to the other. Both could read a file in the shared folder on the other computer. Both are (for now) shown as in the network, showing for a name their numeric address. I could just assign a static address to each one of the computers concerned, and use the pull down menu at the address line to quickly re-connect. But maybe there is a more elegant solution? Note: While the network numeric names appear, it is not in the normal way. In the Navigation Pane, normally under one Network listing are the names of the other computers that are connected to the same network. When I connected with the using the numeric address of the other computer, Network was listed twice in the navigation pane. The name of the computer displaying the file explorer was listed under one Network, and the numeric address of the other computer was listed under another Network heading. Like the two computers are connected on different networks ??

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I later found that only the first time on each computer that I connected with the numeric address of the other computer did the network numeric address appear under a separate Network heading. From then on, there was only one Network heading in File Explorer for both connected computers. Beats me...

I just remembered, there is a Microsoft service that advertises the computer's network features to the network. If this service doesn't run, then you most probably have difficulty connecting to the computer from other computers in the network. One symptom I have seen is that the affected computer is not shown in the list when browsing the network. Manually browsing to \\computername or \\192.168.1.xxx may or may not connect. When the service is running there is no such issue. I don't know the exact English name, translation from Greek is "Publish feature-detection Resources".