Home Networking

[#1]

Hello all. This is my first time so please be gentle with me.
I’m not sure this is the correct place to post this but I am having problems getting my home network to work since I starting using the Tompson Router.
Previously I had a single wireless gateway (for laptops) connected to a Netgear Router for a Dell desktop and everything was fine. Now the Dell and others appear in my network window but when I try to access them I get the message “\\Dell is not accessible. You might not have permission..............Blah Blah. The specified network provider name is invalid”.  Also in the network window is a Dell:Mum_Dad: Media devices (Mum_Dad being one of the user names on the dell). When I access this it opens Windows Media Player but the music displayed is the music on my machine.
I hope this makes some sense. Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks in advance Mike O

[#2]

I forgot to add.
3 machines running Vista Home Premium
1 machine running Windows 7
I have upgraded router firmware
using cat 5 ethernet cable
Mike O.

[#3]

From my POV it looks like 2 issues here. A possible conflict with the Thompson router and / or a problem with Windows. Since you've changed your router I would suggest it may be that at fault.
Is it definitely a router and not just a modem? - Reason I ask is I bought a cheapy from ebay recently which was just a modem and got caught out and had to find an external router to make it all work again and route data packets around the network. My own stupid fault really.

[#4]

You will probably find that the network subnet has changed, the Netgear probably used 192.168.0.x and the Thomson ( I think ! ) uses 192.168.1.x. If you have firewall software on the machines you  may well have to reconfigure it to know that the local network is now 192.168.1.x so that it will allow traffic on that subnet.
Either that OR change the Thomson subnet to be 192.168.0.x , but I don't know how easy that is...

[#5]

Quote from: Mykee

and I don't normaly spell networking with an H.

You can change it if you like Mykee as you can edit the post and title.

[#6]

Thank you Okrzynska and MisterW for your help.
It seems that it was the firewall not allowing traffic as you suggested.
I turned it off at first with no affect, but after reading “Allow a program to communicate through Windows Firewall” in the windows help I opened three ports and voilà.
Thanks very much again for your help and thank you Strat for your editing advice, which I have now corrected as you can see.
Mike O,