Windows 2000 and Windows 7 networking...

[Computer-Lab in Basement]

My printer is shared on my Windows 2000 machine, and I have been trying to set up that shared printer on my Windows 7 machine, but even when I put in the right password for the Windows 2000 machine, it doesn't work.  I have done this a number of times and so far the only solution I have found is to do a complete reinstall of Windows 2000.  However, I do not have this problem with my Windows XP computers.  I put in the same pass I tried in Windows 7 and I can get right in without any issue.  Does anyone have any clue of a way for me to fix this?

[InSanCen]

I haven't used 2000 in a veeery long time, but it sounds like you are having problems with Network Authentication (Kerberos). I vaugely remember it *****ing out over the smallest thing... though it is still far better than trying to get 98 to talk to anything over TCP/IP

Can you login remotely? View publicly shared files over the network?

[Computer-Lab in Basement]

The thing is I was able to get it to work for a little while after I did a complete Windows reinstall of Windows 2000 on my 2000 machine, but now it won't work at all, I have tried creating muntiple administrator accounts and tried logging into each one, and nothing works.  The question I now ask, is this a problem with Win2k or 7?

[Computer-Lab in Basement]

I have never had a Vista installation on any of my computers, because Vista is a worse OS than Windows 98.

[skriefal]

Vista is fine.  It's leagues better than Windows 98 as far as usability and functionality is concerned, but not with regards to resource requirements (but that shouldn't be expected anyway, as it's 8 years newer).  It got a bad rap initially due to poor first-round driver support from 3rd-party vendors, but that has since been resolved.  Windows 7 built on Vista by tweaking a few UI things (Superbar, Aero Peek, etc) and tweaking the resource usage a bit... and it's now considered to be the best thing ever.  Heh.  That's marketing for 'ya.

[Computer-Lab in Basement]

Either way, I still hate Vista.

[InSanCen]

I will however say that getting Windows 7 to cooperate on my network was the most difficult home networking task I've ever attempted. It will remain the most difficult for all eternity as well, since it never happened and my Win7 installation still refuses to cooperate with my other computer(s).

The question I now ask, is this a problem with Win2k or 7?

Almost Certainly a bit of both. Windows7 networking, assuming you are using DHCP, is literally plug n play. If you are static IP'ing, and using 10.0.0.x, then it should "just work" too. I've personally never had a problem. Windows 2000 on the other hand has caused me many problems. Your mileage may vary. I have found that Win2K (and XP as well) can have, for no apparent reason, problems logging into other accounts on the networks for File sharing, on both static and dynamic IP's. It seems Kerberos doesn't like something. My printer works just fine using one of these:-

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=221384

but it refuses to print over a network if the printer is connected locally to the box. Printer is an Epson 1270, I also use a Epson R1800, but I use that networked, and have not tried it locally at all.

Vista is fine.  It's leagues better than Windows 98 as far as usability and functionality is concerned, but not with regards to resource requirements (but that shouldn't be expected anyway, as it's 8 years newer).  It got a bad rap initially due to poor first-round driver support from 3rd-party vendors, but that has since been resolved.  Windows 7 built on Vista by tweaking a few UI things (Superbar, Aero Peek, etc) and tweaking the resource usage a bit... and it's now considered to be the best thing ever.  Heh.  That's marketing for 'ya.

Yup. but, to be fair, it is much better. I turn the eye-candy off anyway so let's ignore that. It works far better than Vista did. Granted, it got a much worse rap because of piss-poor driver support, and they are largely resolved now. If I *had* to buy a M$ OS now, it would be Windows7.

As it is, I use the Penguin variety of software, and any remaining M$ licences are OEM ones that are on Laptops, and a sole XP Pro Retail, that I use as I have yet to discover anything as good as Nero (6, not the new bloatware) for burning, well, anything really. I actually sold off my Win7 licences as 99.9% of our stuff is done in *nix, and CUPS, primitive as the interface is, just works.

[ricercar]

Either way, I still hate Vista.

MIcrosoft philosophy on Vista:
It doesn't matter if you work well, as long as you look good.

[Rajagra]

Vista is fine.

I just did a manual disk defrag in Vista for the first time. They have 'improved' it by having it give NO feedback at all. Just a message saying 'this might take several minutes or several hours.'

It eventually took an hour and a half. Doesn't say much for the scheduled defrags it has been (allegedly) running for me in the background. And I can't tell how good a job it has done because it gave me no info at all. Nothing. Nada. Zip.

For all I know it did nothing at all.

Microsoft: One step forward, one step back, another few million dollars in the bank.

[Rajagra]

What hacked me off about XP's defrag was that it didn't actually defrag. At least not by my definition/standards. In my book a defrag should (A) make every file contiguous; (B) shuffle all files together so the free disk space is also contiguous. PC Tools did a **perfect** job of this*, what, twenty years ago? Windows defraggers have always been sub-par and they get worse and worse. XP's defragger did a poor job of (A) and it didn't do (B) at all. I seriously doubt Vista's is any better. And I suspect that is precisely why they chose not to give any info.

I did try Diskkeeper at one point. It has the option of defragging after a reboot, before Windows starts. So it can do a very good job without any open file issues getting in the way.

(*) Of course PC Tools took about half an hour to defrag a 20MB hard drive, but that's 80s PCs for you.

[Computer-Lab in Basement]

I don't defrag my disks much anyways, considering the largest hard disk I have is 40 Gig.  Also, I never have any reason to do a defrag, if my computer starts running slow or starts having problems, I just do an OS reinstall, and with my old hunks of junk, this is faster and easier than doing a defrag.  It is simple: just collect all your important docs on a USB flash device and format the disk.  I don't think you would need to defrag a freshly formatted disk.

[keyb_gr]

For custom defragmentation, it's hard to beat Jkdefrag / MyDefrag.

[InSanCen]

What hacked me off about XP's defrag was that it didn't actually defrag. At least not by my definition/standards. In my book a defrag should (A) make every file contiguous; (B) shuffle all files together so the free disk space is also contiguous.

If you have no objection to Paying for software, then O&O Defrag. Used it for about 6 years. Plenty of control, and it's fast too, and will adhere to your (correct) definition of Defragmented (In alphabetical order if you want it to).

PC Tools did a **perfect** job of this*, what, twenty years ago? Windows defraggers have always been sub-par and they get worse and worse. XP's defragger did a poor job of (A) and it didn't do (B) at all. I seriously doubt Vista's is any better. And I suspect that is precisely why they chose not to give any info.

(*) Of course PC Tools took about half an hour to defrag a 20MB hard drive, but that's 80s PCs for you.

PC Tools was brilliant, but, IIRC, I was lucky enough to have Norton's Disc Doctor suite on my 386/40 (This was 15 years ago, I was still a teenager, and many legal and illegal substances make that period... well, rather hazy) The college I was in used PC Tools though, and I remember liking it a lot.

(For the youngun's, this was a time when the name Norton meant "Peter Norton had a hand in this and it's good" rather than "Another symantec piece of bloatware").

[Rajagra]

(For the youngun's, this was a time when the name Norton meant "Peter Norton had a hand in this and it's good" rather than "Another symantec piece of bloatware").

Norton then:


Norton software now: