Would it be acceptable to post a few questions here realting to my new purchase. I have a newbies grasp of networking, but little practical experience?
I have purchased and installed a new 2TB NAS drive and it appeared to install, via wireless, ok. I can see, and access from the laptop I used to install the drive, a ‘test share folder’. I did not appear to have to use a user name or password when I set it all up - it all seemed to happen without much intervention from me. I suppose that is good.
But now I want to share that ‘test share’ folder with another user on another tower pc. Naturally this other tower PC is connected to the same switch as the MDL NAS.
Despite reading the help menu, I cannot for the life of me see how to set this up. I am aware that I have to somehow set up this second user, on the second (tower) PC.
Is this an acceptable question to ask here? Would be most grateful for a step by step guide. Regards, yt.
Sorry - new to your forum. Cannot see a way to edit my original post above.
I should have said that the wireless laptop that I used to install the MBL runs Windows 7, the second tower PC that I would like to use with it runs Windows XP professional.
PS. I can now see a way to edit my original post - but not how to delete this one!
Just do the same thing you did, chances are you are connecting to the “public” folder on the MBL.
However, if you need to create folders with different permissions, you will need to create the share NOT under public. You will also have to define a new user and its permissions. Also, read the PDF manual as oppose to the help pages.
On the laptop PC (the one I used to install the MBL) I can see the MBL and all it’s folders.I think understand the principles of setting up other folders and shares on the MBL - which can have full public access or limited access to users to whom I give permission to see these shares with limited access priviledges.
My first stumbling block appears to be that the tower PC ( a second PC connected to the same network) does not see the MBL at all. This second PC uses windows XP Prof.
If I type http://192.168.1.3 into the web browser of the tower PC then ‘yes’ I see the opening splash screen of the MBL.
I can navigate around the menus - I could for example even navigate to the ‘create a new user screen’ (although I stopped short of actually creating a new user). Why can do this? - this was not the machine I used to install the MBL, surely it should not have admin rights like this?
I could plod around the drive and found a public folder I created from the laptop when I was playing around initially and could access a jpg file I temporarliy stored in there.
Two points spring to mind:
Why does the second (Tower) pc appear to have admin rights on the MBL when it was not used to install the MBL.
I had perhaps naively expected the MBL to pop up somwhere when I opened up windows explorer on the XP machine, to be able to click on it and be presented with a list of folders, some of which I would be able to access if I had the necessary permissions etc which would have been set up by the admin user on the laptop PC I originally used to install the MBL. I would have to know (and enter) perhaps a local user name and password to enter these folders/shares.
I am seriously missing the point somewhere, but, I have to accept that my networking skills are at a very low level - so any help appreciated.
http://192.168.1.3 is how you would admin the MBL, create users, shares, etc. Setup a password for security. This is not different as you would access your router, http://192.168.1.1 probably. In a few words, it is management access.
\192.168.1.3 is how you access the shares and can mount a drive as well. Depending the share and how you set it up, it might ask you for a username/passwd or not.
So if I lock the drive with a password, would any user:
Still be able to ‘see’ the drive on any PC and access and change the contents of the public shares and shares to which the admin have set up the necessary priviledges?
So how do I see the MBL on the explorer folders view on my second XP machine. Do I have to map the IP address of the MBL to a drive on the PC?
Some like 192.168.1.3 = drive T
If the drive IP address is set under DHCP won’t this ampping break down/
Sorry for asking these questions will I know will appear simple to you all, perhaps confusing even. But as a newbie to all this ‘we’ tend to ask questions of experts from a direction they’re not expecting.
Happy to get a pointer to a good website, clear off and read all about it, then come back here with some pertinent and refined questions.
So if I lock the drive with a password, would any user Still be able to ‘see’ the drive on any PC and access and change the contents of the public shares and shares to which the admin have set up the necessary priviledges?
Yes, yes, and yes.
What a user SEES is a “superset” of what a user can ACCESS. *ANY* PC in your workgroup can see all of the shares that “exist” on the MBL, but only users with proper authority can ACCESS the shares and their content.
As to PUBLIC shares, any user can see AND access the PUBLIC share. That’s by definition.
So how do I see the MBL on the explorer folders view on my second XP machine. Do I have to map the IP address of the MBL to a drive on the PC? Some like 192.168.1.3 = drive T
That’s often the most convenient way to do it.
If the drive IP address is set under DHCP won’t this [mapping] break down/
Yes. If you map it by IP address instead of by NAME, and if the MBL’s address changes, then yes, the mappings will fail. If you map them by NAME, then Windows is prepared to deal with the IP address change immediately.
But very good point. I checked the laptop and the MBL and both were on WORKGROUP. I checked the Tower PC and that was set to something else. I changed that to be WORKGROUP and after a restart now the tower pc can see the MBL and the two public folders on it - progress indeed! (thank you).
I have now also set the owners password on the MBL using the laptop after the earlier advice here.
So, now I have created two users (tower_pc and laptop_pc). I have created two new private shares - one to be available to the tower_pc and the other to the laptop_pc.
But if I go back to windows explorer on the Tower PC, although the Tower PC can see the MBL and those 2 public shares, it cannot ‘see’ the 2 new private shares - one of which I expect to maybe click on and be prompted for the user name and password.
Thanks once more for all the help here, i wouldn’t have gotten to this stage without your assistance.
