Home network computers aren't shown in Windows Explorer

Anonymous
2018-06-24T06:56:05+00:00

I have two laptops A and B. They were connected wirelessly through my router on a HomeGroup and it worked fine. In the latest Win 10 upgrade the HomeGroup has been deleted and since then I have had terrible trouble connecting them.

I hibernate the laptops each night. When I open them in the morning, Laptop A can see and access laptop B in the Network folder of Windows Explorer. But laptop B doesn't always see laptop A and I can't get it to see it (not even by putting \laptopnamein the address bar).

Sometimes laptop B does show laptop A but when I try to access it I get a 'Windows can't connect" message.

I have tried all the sharing, credential and other options to make sure they are all consistent - nothing changes.

The ONLY way I have found for laptop B to access A is to restart laptop B (NOT A). Then it will automatically connect to A.

How do I get back to the old HomeGroup system of both computers accessing one another automatically when I wake them up?

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Internet and connectivity

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  1. Pauli O 16,380 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2018-07-03T10:58:27+00:00

    "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.

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  2. Anonymous
    2018-07-03T11:50:21+00:00

    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.

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  3. Pauli O 16,380 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2018-07-03T12:07:07+00:00

    "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."

    I am aware of that, that's why I have addresses .002 - .100 free because occasionally I need those for testing purposes with network devices that required static addressing to work properly. (Domain controller with dynamic addressing = The road to ruin.)

    While this manual assignment doesn't require free address space it's anyway good idea to keep some range of addresses outside lease pool.

    As you can see my example of my router setting, Buffalo use "Manually Assignment".

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