Noise Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 Hi In the building we rent space from, all computers from all the companies connect into the overall building network to gain access to the internet and other computers. The problem I am having is that other companies have begun to be able to see the files on our computers since we have moved office internally within the building. We have a Workgroup setup for our company with a mixture of Win XP Pro and Win 7 operating systems on our computers. Does anyone know how to prevent other companies seeing our files ? Many thanks N Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 I think your best bet would be to separate yourself from the network using a vlan (Virtual LAN). Here is a link to an article that explains it and shows what equipment you will need. http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/lanwan-howto/30071-vlan-how-to-segmenting-a-small-lan This will isolate your computers from the others in the building. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 19, 2012 Author Share Posted September 19, 2012 Hi Aubery thanks for your reply, I will look into that. I would have thought there would be an option for only members of a workgroup to have access to the computers on a workgroup. How I love Microsoft ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 To do that you would need to create a domain server, users and groups that would allow you to authenticate the users and then assign permissions to all of the shares based on those groups and users. Much easier to just do a vlan for what you want to do. Alternately if you only have a few computers you could create an account, the same account, on each computer and then assign the permissions for the shares to that account and admins only. The other computers on the network would be able to still see the shared folder but would have to provide a username and password to access it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 19, 2012 Author Share Posted September 19, 2012 To create a domain server what OS would I need ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 19, 2012 Share Posted September 19, 2012 Windows NT/Server 2003/Server 2008 would work but that would be a lot more setup and work than what I suggested above unless you have a lot of computers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 19, 2012 Author Share Posted September 19, 2012 Would it be a potential solution to ask the building management to put in a separate router just for our company at the patch panel ? I am not knowledgeable on networking so apologies if this is nonesense ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 20, 2012 Share Posted September 20, 2012 If the building management has an I.T. person, go talk to them and explain your problem, they may have the capability for a vlan already. I still think the easiest thing (again if you don't have too many computers) is to create a user account on each PC and then change the permissions for the share to include only admins and the user that you created. It is really not that hard to do. It would not take more than 10-15 minutes to set it up on each PC. If you pay the plane fare I'll come on over and do it for you Here are some links to get you started. http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/Windows7/Create-a-user-account http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb456988.aspx (for XP but 7 is similar) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 20, 2012 Author Share Posted September 20, 2012 Hi Aubery Will this work with some computers running Windows 7 and some running Win XP Pro ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 20, 2012 Share Posted September 20, 2012 Yes it will, the setup is similar between 7 and XP. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 25, 2012 Author Share Posted September 25, 2012 Hi Aubery, you mentioned; I still think the easiest thing (again if you don't have too many computers) is to create a user account on each PC and then change the permissions for the share to include only admins and the user that you created. We store all our working files on a server machine and connect to that over the network when we want to work on a file - with regard to your suggestion above, will we have full uninterrupted access to the server files all the time or will we have to log onto the server each day ? Also, does the above setup allow people in other companies to browse our files but not edit them ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 25, 2012 Share Posted September 25, 2012 Hi Aubery, you mentioned; I still think the easiest thing (again if you don't have too many computers) is to create a user account on each PC and then change the permissions for the share to include only admins and the user that you created. We store all our working files on a server machine and connect to that over the network when we want to work on a file - with regard to your suggestion above, will we have full uninterrupted access to the server files all the time or will we have to log onto the server each day ? Also, does the above setup allow people in other companies to browse our files but not edit them ? Once you log on you will have full uninterrupted access. If you shut down your computer or the server shuts down then you would need to log in again. Worst case is that they would have to type in the password once each morning which is no big deal. The computers from the other companies would see only the shared folders and not any of the files. If they try to look at the files they will be prompted to enter a username and password. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noise Posted September 26, 2012 Author Share Posted September 26, 2012 Hi Aubery I created Users on all machines with the same name then changes the Permissions on the server to only allow Users with that name to have access to the files but now I cannot get access to the server. I appreciate your help but if you cannot hazard a suggestion on this that's fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AubreyM Posted September 27, 2012 Share Posted September 27, 2012 Hi Aubery I created Users on all machines with the same name then changes the Permissions on the server to only allow Users with that name to have access to the files but now I cannot get access to the server. I appreciate your help but if you cannot hazard a suggestion on this that's fine. You have to create that user on the server as well and be sure you also shared the folder and that file & printer sharing is turned on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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