net share drive on Virtual PC

[NOTS3W]

I use Virtual PC for testing and that may be a key to this problem. Can anyone confirm, please?

My network consists of two physical computers, Mars and Venus. On Mars, I'm building an unattended replacement installation temporarily named Mars2. Each PC has two shared drives, C and D. I use net use in cleanup.cmd (on Mars2) to map to both drives on both Mars and Venus. No problem. I use net share to share both drives on Mars2 but neither Mars nor Venus can map to either drive on Mars2. Here are the net share lines in cleanup.cmd on Mars2:

:: Share local drives
net share "Mars2 C"=C:\
net share "Mars2 Data 1"=D:\

After installation, the drives look like they're shared (the icons change to shared drive icons) and Mars2 appears on the networked computers list when I try to map to those drives from the other machines. When I click on Mars2 to display its drives, I get a clock for a few seconds, then nothing. The + sign next to Mars2 goes away as if there are no shared resources on that machine.

I'm a little suspicious that this is a limitation of Virtual PC. Can anyone confirm that my net share commands are correct and/or that this is typical for Virtual PC? I don't want to buy VMWare but I could try VirtualBox if that would solve the problem.

Thanks.

Ray

[submix8c]

NOTS3W :

I use Virtual PC for testing and that may be a key to this problem. Can anyone confirm, please?

My network consists of two physical computers, Mars and Venus.

Physical computers? Virtual PC's? Which is which? Please be more precise as to the setup. It is possible to share between both Physical and Virtual, depending on what you have as far as "real" and "virtual" NIC's. It just requires a little "finesse" to get them talking. Firewall and User Priveledges also come into play.

[NOTS3W]

Sorry I didn't get back here sooner. Weekend got in the way of much progress. I'll try again:

I have two computers. Each is a Dell Dimension 4500 running XP Home. Each has two shared hard drives (C and D) and a single NIC. One is named Mars, the other Venus. They are attached to a 2-Wire DSL router/firewall. Those are what I meant by the "physical" computers.

On Mars, I am building an unattended CD which, when everything is working as I like, will be used to reinstall XP Home on Mars. In order to test the unattended CD, I've installed Microsoft's Virtual PC on that machine (Mars) and carved off 512MB of memory, 5GB of C drive space and 5GB of D drive space for the virtual machine. Virtual PC controls sharing of other resources like the NIC, audio and video systems, keyboard, mouse, and emulates other resources like the CD drive. When I start Virtual PC, it acts like its own computer with its own hard drives, memory, CD, etc. but it's running within Mars.

On the virtual computer, I can install my test unattended XP Home installation by "mounting" the ISO image of what will soon become the installation CD on the emulated CD drive of the virtual computer. When I restart Virtual PC, it boots off the virtual CD and installs XP Home just as any other computer would boot off of a real CD and install Windows. When the installation is complete, I have three computers on the network:

Mars, Dell Dimension, single NIC, most of a 40GB C drive, most of a 160GB D drive, IP 192.168.1.64

Venus, Dell Dimension, single NIC, all of a 40GB C drive, all of a 160GB D drive, IP 192.168.1.66

Mars2 (creative, eh?), Virtual PC, shared NIC, 5GB C drive, 5GB D drive, IP 192.168.1.78

Mars and Venus can access one another's hard drives as before. Mars2 can access all of the shared hard drives on both Mars and Venus. All three computers can access the Internet and all three can be online simultaneously. To the network, Mars2 looks like a third computer. The router even sees Mars2 as a separate machine, assigning it its own IP address. And when I log onto the router, I can see all shared drives, including those on Mars2.

This all works very well for testing my installation. If anything goes wrong, I simply close the Virtual PC window like I'd close any other application and start over. The only shortcomings of Virtual PC that I'm aware of are (1) it does not support USB which means that I cannot use or test any USB devices on Mars2, it doesn't think it has any. And (2) I'm not sure how Virtual PC handles the various hardware drivers I install with Windows since there isn't a real video card, for example, on Mars2. I'm having to trust that those drivers will work when I install Windows on the real hardware to recreate Mars.

I hope that explains what I meant by two physical computers + one virtual computer = three computers.

Ray

[submix8c]

NOTS3W :

Ok, that is much more clear... However you specify that MARS2 has a "shared NIC"; is this by chance the real NIC on MARS? If so, this may (or may not) cause a problem.

I have not tried your setup (since I don't have the resources), but I do have a single NIC (was two) on my PC. I have Virtual PC 2004 (for testing Win98SE installs with AutoPatcher 98SE) and use the following setup:

-Add two Loopback Adapters on physical PC;

-- one (ICS) is pointed to by the real NIC (i.e. set for Internet Connection Sharing)

------- (note: real NIC is set to automatic so ISP can assign it)

------- on real PC, manually set IP 192.168.0.1, subnet 255.255.255.0, Gateway (empty)

------- on Virt PC, "obtain IP automatically" (VPC assigned; 192.168.0.x, subnet 255.255.255.0, Gateway 192.168.0.1)

-- other (LCL) is a stand-alone for sharing between physical PC and VPC

------- on real PC, manually set IP 192.168.2.2, subnet 255.255.255.0, Gateway (empty)

------- on Virt PC, manually set IP 192.168.2.3, subnet 255.255.255.0, Gateway (empty)

On Virt PC (under Settings) I assign the Loopbacks, not the real NIC. VPC uses Intel DC21140 as the NIC anyhow (in case you didn't notice under MARS2 while running).

I also assume you have the router set up so that MARS and VENUS have the designated IP's assigned(?).

"NET SHARE" is apparently a Win2k/XP (and above?) parameter and not available in Win9x, but the result is the same when a specific folder is Shared on either/both on my setup.

Perhaps there is some sort of conflict if you have assigned the real NIC on MARS to MARS2 (via Settings) and you should maybe be using Loopback Adapters ("Virtual" adapters on the physical PC). Try using one (at least) and see if that works.

Also, yep, no USB's. And more than likely you should have no problem for an Unattanded CD Install on any of the PC's (real or virtual) since I believe (based upon the model PC's) that the hardware will be "found" during install in any case.

I'm not an expert, just trying to help. This works for me (using a common Network Logon), so let me know how it goes...

Edited June 10, 2007 by submix8c