romerz

Thanks again for your quick reply, Im having a good look around, trying to gather all of the information that I can. One thing that most places seem to be lacking in, are the steps in which to make the actual XP Machines log into the domain. What would I be changing on the XP machines in order to make them part of the domain? Also, just to clarify, the end result in this would be the users not noticing any difference or anything complex, they just login to their machines and the shared folders are in their network files section. Is this correct ? Thanks again for not only the info, but the quick info

Thanks for the reply. We have the windows 2003 machine, and around 15 XP Machines. The reason I didn't go into AD is because I don't know enough about it. I have been reading up on it tonight however. Am I correct in assuming that I can add the 'Machine' to AD? So say one computer's computer name is 'XPMACHINE1' - Would I then be able to add this machine in AD under the 'Users and Computers' section, share the folder with that machine - and the machine would then be able to see it in 'My Network Places' - or am I missing key steps (My machine is currently on WORKGROUP. With AD it would then swap over to a domain called Server.whatever.local or whatever I name it). Each machine just assumes that is its own stand alone machine by the way. They have never been set up as a workstation or anything (not sure if this is needed for a domain) Would I then have to do anything with the domain? This process you describe of basically importing the machines profile sounds like it may be good, if it doesn't end up the same as me just adding the machine to the Users and Computers. Would the process ive made an asumption at above be anywere close to getting the shared folder apearing in the machines network places?

Hi, What we had before were loads of windows xp machines with shared folders, these folders were shared with everyone and apeared in everyones my network places. Simple enough. We have a server with windows 2003 running on it. Its running as a DHCP server aswell. What I want to do is simple - use it as a file server. I dont have it running as a domain and active directory is not running either. I have a folder on the C:/ called Files. Ive shared this folder with everyone. Set share permissons to everyone and gave them full control. Is there any way to get this folder to show on all the XP machines on the network? Ive tried even going to add a network place on the XP machines however in the workgroup - I can find SERVER, but with no shared folders that come from it. The only way I can connect is by going to \\server\Files and putting in the Admin username and password. Am I able to do what im wanting to do with a workgroup - I really can't go around all the machines and change their computer names to Administrator and give them the same password as the server (I assume this is how I would get round this (though this would mean I would need to manually go around ever computer adding the shared place)). Do I need to create a domain and user active directory. I don't know much about either of these. If this is the case, would anyone be kind enough to link me a tutorial on this, or even give me some tips. I find it odd to believe that something so simple and useful that windows XP can do, windows server 2003 is unable to do.