Firewall Blocks File Sharing in Vista

For some reasons, my laptop (Microsoft Vista) unable to share files in my office network. I can connect my laptop to my office PC (Microsoft XP) but not the other way round. Ping is okay but is the file sharing doesn't work from Vista to XP. I have tried couples of steps but no lucks. However, this doesn't happen in my home network where I can share files in 2 ways with my PC (XP).

At last, I figure out the firewall which blocks the file sharing in Vista. I do enable the file sharing in the firewall (that's why I can use it in my home network) and somehow it doesn't allow in my office network. So what I did is to disable the firewall and everything works fine. I just disable the firewall in local LAN network but not the wireless LAN network. It should be quite safe since most of the time I use the wireless LAN network.

I don't know if this is a bug but I believe so since I"m working fine in my home network. So if you encounter file sharing in Vista, for a quick fix you may want to try disable the firewall. It may works. Perhaps you have a better idea even with firewall enabled? I will try your tips then.

Rescue Windows System Files - SFC Utility

One of the thing that I dislike Windows as compared to Linux is the stability issues. Windows loves to crash especially if you do not restart your PC for a long period of time. It happens to me many times already. Most of the cases, what I do is to re-install my windows. I have been doing this once a year in average.

What the heck yesterday, it happened to me again. 2 of my main applications (i.e. MS office, Citrix Client) cannot run at all after I restarted my PC. It has some kind of "dynamic dll link error". I try the system restore point, it didn't help at all. Ok, never mind, I re-installed one by one to fix the problems.

However, I'm happy too fast. I got the following RUNDLL error message when I run the system properties from control panel:

"An exception occurred while trying to run "C:\WINDOWS\system32\shell32.dll, Control_RunDLL "C:\WINDOWS\system32\sysdm.cpl", System"



It seems like the sysdm.cpl is corrupted and I have no choice to reinstall the OS. I hate windows! I almost give up until I find a utility called "SFC" - System File Checker I guess. It is the utility that comes together with Windows. It able to rescue all the protected system files. What you need to do is to run the following command in your command prompt:

• sfc /scannow

You need to put your original Windows OS CD into the drive and the SFC will do the rest. After running the SFC utility, the problem above doesn't occur anymore. Oh, thanks I learn one new thing today that I no need to reinstall the whole OS for system files corruption (which I used to do) to save my little baby. It saves me a lot of time too (i.e. time to install the OS and all the applications). Hope this is something helpful to you, perhaps not now but in future.

Few tips and trick:

1. Restart your PC at least once a week
2. Run "chkdsk" at least once a week
   
3. If windows system files corrupted, try use system restore point.
4. If it doesn't work, try the SFC utility.

This is assuming your PC is not attacked by virus or hackers. This is assuming your PC is attacked by himself (Windows OS) - self destructive mode. I'm just kidding. Good luck!