Network oddities

[Bry]

Please see image

Let me explain it a bit and the problem in more detail.

All computers/devices can see the internet. However, PC1 and Media player can not access Media Serve or laptop and vice versa.
They can however see each other in network or my network places. They just can not access each other.
The computers can not be pinged or tracert either via IP or via their netbios name.

PC1 and Media player can communicate fine and so can Media Server and Laptop.
This would have led me to believe the solwise mediastream 1Gb homeplugs to be at fault but the internet is being routed through them so I have ruled them out.

Tested various cat5e cables and all computers can see each other if plugged into one switch.
I have also tried setting static IPS on each computer but have now rolled back to DHCP as this made no difference. File and printer sharing is enabled and all computers have their firewall turned off.

PC1 and Laptop are running Windows 7 and Media Server is running WHS.
The media player is a popcorn C200 (running samba for networking)


Any ideas how I can get PC1/Media player talking to the Media Server?


p.s. if anyone can solve this one they can have a cookie

 

[anything I don't mind]

First guess is that there is a problem with the ethernet over power. As a test i would take the gigabit switch and the pc1 to wherever the other switch is and bypass the ethernet over power. If it works then you know it is the ethernet over power. If it still has the problem then i would look at the switches. Try and put the laptop in to the other switch and see if it can see the media server. Are the switches managed ie, do they have a web based config where you can do advanced features ?

 

[Zarf]

Can you ping the router from PC1? If so can you double-check that you are trying to ping the correct IP on the Media Server? What happens if you turn off the wireless on your laptop and plug it in via PC1's network cable?

 

[Chief Wiggum]

Do PC1 and the media player pickup an ip through dhcp?
If not, I'd suggest maybe putting an x-over cable between the two switches (on one end of the power line gear) I'm not sure how the power line stuff operates but I'm assuming it doesn't auto uplink?

 

[Bry]

Hi,

1) yes every device can ping the router
2) Definitely pinging correct IP's
3) If wireless si turned off on the laptop and connected via PC1 network port then it can not access media server
4)All devices are currently set via DHCP and are picking up the ip and subnet mask correctly. However, I have tried setting them all manually as well this made no difference.

Groen,
1)if laptop goes into other switch (as well as or instead of PC1) then it can not see the media server
2) switches are unmanaged so no interface unfortunately
3) will try taking the other switch and laptop upstairs see if they can access each other, thats something I didn't think of trying.

Its just weird as there is a working network due to full internet access, dhcp and computers viewable in network palces just not accessible.

 

[PistolPete]

Sounds like a job for Wireshark.

As all machines can access the internet there is something odd that either the power adaptors or the switches (or probably the switch with the router connected to it).

 

[Zarf]

Seems very odd, If the internet is working fine across the powerline there's no real reason why network connectivity shouldn't. Pings get through to the router just fine too so there's no low level reason they shouldn't work with the media server.

What happens if you run 'arp -a <media server ip>'?
Try running a 'netsh int ip reset' on both media server and PC1. This has helped me before, usually in cases where Norton or other bloatware software firewalls have been uninstalled and left a mess in their wake. Power cycling all the switches can't hurt either (give them a couple of minutes off to clean the address tables)

Speaking of firewalls, are you doubly sure that Media Server isn't running one? Certain network cards have their own built in ones (Killer NIC, and nVidia onboards iirc). If you torrent you might also have an IP blocker running there which somehow had some private addresses added. Updating your image with the full IP's of each machine might be useful to us also.
You could also have a play with IPv6, just set some static link-local addresses (fe80::1, fe80::2 etc) and see if you can ping using these.