Home network computers aren't shown in Windows Explorer

I didn't notice that you edited it away.

If an IP address is statically assigned on the device (=printer for instance) this IP address will not get excluded from that pool and may clash with it! That device doesn't use DHCP and has a "real" static IP. The router doesn't know anything about it. Nevertheless, it works like a normal IP address as long as the router doesn't try to assign the same IP address to another device (and it does that because it doesn't know ... the circle closes here). You can circumvent this by switching that device to DHCP and assigning a manual IP address on the router. As you do for the PCs. Same procedure. But you don't have to if it is guaranteed there can't be a clash.

If an IP address is assigned "manually" (manually is a good term to distinguish it from static) on the router it has to come from the dynamic IP pool range, of course. It's that range that the router controls. The manual assignment on the router is not a "real" static IP address. It only tells the router to always keep assigning this address via DHCP. And it can only assign what's in its pool. That's why you can only assign an IP manually that is in that pool. Everything outside this range is for use on the device (e.g. you switch off DHCP on the device and tell it what IP address to use) without any router intervention.

Your first advice was good. I hope your clarification doesn't confuse Roger. ;-)

Roger, the IP pool range doesn't matter. If you have only two devices a range from .50 to .60 (ten numbers) would already suffice. Tell us the current IP numbers of all your devices on the network and if they are on DHCP or not and we can tell you if you should change the IP pool range. If I understood correctly you have at least four devices on the network: router, printer, two PCs.

"As suggested you can reduce the end range to 100 or even lower."

I edited that suggestion away from my answer when I find that possible : issue while I recheck my router settings.

My IP-address lease pool is 192.168.100.101 - 254, from where also those manually assigned addresses are taken so there is no need to change router start and stop addresses for that. That manual assignment should automatic exclude those addresses.

I have another reasons keep part of addresses available for static addressing.

Let us know if you can all working, also that internet connection via mobile phone.

Ok, that page should list the currently connected devices. There should be a list. Where is it? I would suppose it's below the two buttons?

It also looks like your browser window is very narrow. Can you make it wider? I guess the three table headers and the two buttons should be on one line. And below that line there should be a table of the currently connected devices or all the devices that ever connected (that's why there is that button "remove entries").

If that table doesn't show an option or explicit text that it tries to assign permanently you can assign maximum 32 IPs permanently, as Pauli suggests.

How does the table show MAC addresses? with - or with : ? Likely with ":". That's the Unix way. Type them in the same way. It's possible that when a device is currently connected you cannot add a static lease. Normally, just assign the same IP as static that you see in the list, anyway.

As suggested you can reduce the end range to 100 or even lower. I remember you told about a printer earlier. If I recall right you set a static IP address for it (in the printer setup?). Make sure this address is *outside* this range = e.g. 101 or so). It's possible that until now this static assignment created a conflict on your network because that static IP no. was within the range controlled by the DHCP server of the router.

One further notice: WPS is for getting access to the WLAN network. You do not want to use WPS. You already have access to your WLAN. Just ignore that lengthy tutorial by S. It may be correct, but it's too long and too confusingly written.

Brilliant! The MAC addresses have to have : not - between the figures. Thanks for that.

I now have a reasonable network arrangement - it remains to be seen whether it stays that way. I will let you know.

Again, do not turn off your router! At least not before you have fixed your problem!

How do you suppose should your PC get an IP address from that router when that router is not fully up yet? You have to power up your router at least 5 minutes before you switch the PC on! And then it depends on the router whether it is able to preserve these settings over reboots or not. Normally it should be able, though. Electricity use of a router is negligable. It probably uses less in 24 hours than your PC in 1 hour.

I do not know where you would find the relevant settings with your specific router. There should be a page which lists the currently connected devices with MAC no. (that is a unique number of the network chip in your PC) and with IP no. Write them down. Then switch off your PC (s) for a few minutes and then boot them up again. Check again. Apart from that: look on that page or a page with details for each of the devices if there is an option or text about permanent assignment. (Quigmo tells/shows you more about this.) You may have to click a checkmark for that. So, what you do is *not* add your devices to assign them "permanent" IP addresses in your router. Normally, you look at that router page and "nod it up" so to speak.

Outlook: You need the permanent assignment of IP addresses, so that, in the next step, you can assign a host name to each IP address and can then reliably reach the PC that you want to reach by name instead of checking for it's IP address first. Then, in yet another step, you would have to determine what you want to reach on each PC and share those folders. You then have to assign permissions for each user to reach those folders. (I've never used HomeGroups. I assume the HomeGroups feature took away the first step by assigning always the same hostnames to varying IP addresses by way of the mshome.net net.)

Yes, the modem is now set to get IP addresses automatically. The only way I have been told to set static addresses is by changing the IPv4 settings on each computer. But that then stops me from accessing my mobile phone's hotspot

Exactly. That's why I told you to go back to DHCP (=dynamic assignment). You wrote: the modem is now set to get IP addresses automatically. NO! You may mean it another (the right) way, but in that wording it's wrong and may confuse you later. Your PCs are set to *get* IP addresses automatically. And the router hands them out via DHCP, so it *sets* them automatically. And it should re-use always the same IP address for the same device. In turn, your PC will usually request that very same IP address it got the last time and the router will "nod" to that (this is called "re-lease" as in "lease again"). The sequence is "PC asks, router replies". Each time you boot up the PC it will start this question-answer-game. The lease time for the IP address is usually 24 hours. No later than that time the PC *has* to request again.