N5200 - The Mystery Drive!!

[jetjockey]

Hi all. ;D

Got a peculiar but frustarating problem with my 5200 running FW 2.00.00, but I think it was also there on FW 1.00.08 or 7.

Basically, on both my Vista Premium machines (well speced) the N5200 is sporadically almost invisible in "Network Places".

What do I mean by "sporadically almost invisible"??.........

I mean sometimes the N5200 is visible (My Network Places) as a particular icon and clicking on it then opens up a "Windows Explorer" type window and shows all the folders etc on the N5200.... Excellent.

Then, at any time, and without warning, opening "my Network Places" results in a different icon being shown for the N5200. Clicking on it then opens an "Internet Explorer window" and takes you direct to the N5200 Web GUI...... Frustrating.

At no time has the N5200 shown up under "My Computer" or in the normally initiated "Windows Explorer" browser?? Should it??

This is not only sporadic, but can even result in the N5200 showing on one Vista Machine and not on the other at the same time? I have tried the N5200 with UPNP switched and off. However..... opening "My Network Places" always results in both Vista machines being visible, and my UPNP gateway, and my Netgear professional 8 way Gigabit copper switch!!!

Once, when the "Browseable" icon was showing in "My Network Places" on the first Vista machine, I created a shortcut to it on the desktop. Would you believe that this shortcut works everytime and immediately opens a Browser window showing the N5200 contents, even when the icon has vanished again from "My Network Places"!! On the second Vista machine I then created a shortcut on the desktop to the first Vista machine. I then altered the properties to show "\\N5200" as the Target. Bingo!!!!!!! This also immediately opens a browseable window showing the N5200 contents, despite the fact that this machine has not shown the N5200 in "My Network Places" for weeks!!

Can somebody shed any light on this please before I start tearing my hair out (nearly bald already).

Finally, I have tried to Map the N5200 as a network drive and show it in "My Computer" or "Windows Explorer" and have failed miserably. I have tried \\N5200 and variants of 192.168.1.x and only get results if I specify a folder on the N5200. I don't want to map just a folder, I want to show the Entire N5200 as a physical drive. Where am I going wrong?

Many thanks, Jet.

[fabi]

Are you using DHCP? Try giving it a static IP. That solved our sporadic disconnectivity.

You can only map items in network that are shared with samba. So to access the whole drive you need to create a share that points to /raid/data or even to / if you wish to. That may not be possible with the web interface and needs to be done with SSH in /etc/samba/smb.conf

bye Fabi

[peterfu]

fabi said:

.... and needs to be done with SSH in /etc/samba/smb.conf

But consider, that the smb.conf file is from FW 2.00.xx on overwritten each time the N5200 boots.
br
Peter

[fabi]

peterfu said:

But consider, that the smb.conf file is from FW 2.00.xx on overwritten each time the N5200 boots.

Is there a way around this? Otherwise that would be a reason for us to never update the firmware to 2.x.

bye Fabi

[peterfu]

Yes, as far as I remember one user uses IMGDUP to make everything writeable and then changed the script - start of samba daemon - to avoid overwritting.
But I can't find the thread at the moment.
br
Peter