Trying to map a network drive

Rob2D

Hi guys,

I'm having awful trouble at work trying to get a machine to talk to one of our PC's over an ethernet cable.

The machine runs on old Windows NT and tries to connect to a folder on the r:drive in the connected office PC. But lately it can't seem to find the path:



The folder:



Connection to machine:



Now the controller software on the machine is all password protected so nobody changed anything there, so something must have happened in the office. And apparently this happened before and a system restore solved it. But that was a long time ago.

I've had a look and things seem OK so short of another system restore (if even possible) what things should I check? As I said I took a basic look but I'm not very well up on networks.

Firewall stuff maybe????

Thanks

ED E

Is this a PC - PC connection?

That "Received 0" says it all really, the two machines are not talking at all. If you have two PCs in their own network with no router you need to setup manual addressing. From the screenshot its expecting 10.0.0.200 for the "Server" (non NT) PC. I would guess its currently self assigning a 169. address which is a place holder. Reconfigure the LAN adapter with the correct details and it should come straight back.



Note: NT uses a really old version of SMB, if anyone ever gets into your network they can have at anything they want. Time to retire that gear even if its awkward and connected to niche hardware etc.

Rob2D

Sound yeah that worked.

It wasn't a 169 just a normal 192 that was in there. Nobody knows how it got changed.

As for the old NT machine, it's part of this so there's no chance of it ever being changed I'm afraid! :pac:

ED E

If the OEM doesnt have an upgrade programme (is defunct) then isolating vulnerable devices in a very limited VLAN is advisable.

Cuddlesworth

ED E wrote: »

If the OEM doesnt have an upgrade programme (is defunct) then isolating vulnerable devices in a very limited VLAN is advisable.

In other words, if a single virus gets access to your network, that machine is toast.

Rob2D

Me again! :pac:

So these two aren't talking again. They can talk to other machines just not each other.

I reckon it was a Windows 10 update in the office that changed something. If all the network adapter and share settings look good, would there be anything that I overlooked

Accidentally

Windows 10 updates are disabling SMB1.0. This could kill your ability to connect to an NT share, so start by enabling SMB1 on the Win 10 machine.

If as it sounds, this NT machine is critical to your business, you really need to move it to a modern OS. Its an accident waiting to happen on an open network.

Rob2D

Accidentally wrote: »

Windows 10 updates are disabling SMB1.0. This could kill your ability to connect to an NT share, so start by enabling SMB1 on the Win 10 machine.

If as it sounds, this NT machine is critical to your business, you really need to move it to a modern OS. Its an accident waiting to happen on an open network.

Yup that was it. I discovered it by accident in a forum thread at like 6 o clock on Friday.

Re-enabled SMB1 and its all good again.

Price of a new computer for that machine is 15K so no chance of that happening any time soon I'd say.

But that machine is actually the newest one we own that's connected to another PC by network. We have older ones connected by RS232. And there are other companies nearby that have the same machines.

It's not at all unusual in our industry for these machines to have a life expectancy of 30+ years. Once they're put in place they're expected to stay that way forever.

Dr_Bill

Accidentally wrote: »

Windows 10 updates are disabling SMB1.0. This could kill your ability to connect to an NT share, so start by enabling SMB1 on the Win 10 machine.

If as it sounds, this NT machine is critical to your business, you really need to move it to a modern OS. Its an accident waiting to happen on an open network.

I have an old NAS which I cannot connect to via a Windows 10 machine but can via Windows 7.

Unfortunately the NAS is now end of life so no more firmware updates are available to me but looks like thanks to your suggestion I should be able to get it going again.

Cuddlesworth

Rob2D wrote: »

Yup that was it. I discovered it by accident in a forum thread at like 6 o clock on Friday.

Re-enabled SMB1 and its all good again.

Price of a new computer for that machine is 15K so no chance of that happening any time soon I'd say.

But that machine is actually the newest one we own that's connected to another PC by network. We have older ones connected by RS232. And there are other companies nearby that have the same machines.

It's not at all unusual in our industry for these machines to have a life expectancy of 30+ years. Once they're put in place they're expected to stay that way forever.

And when a virus hits and takes out all these machines at once? Because all it takes is 1 email or USB key.

Rob2D

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

And when a virus hits and takes out all these machines at once? Because all it takes is 1 email or USB key.

Well what can I do? The office PC needs to be constantly online because of the cad/cam software on it. Otherwise I'd disconnect it.

For the foreseeable future we'll just have to hope that nothing bad gets through!

Cuddlesworth

At the worst, you put it behind a firewall and IPS and restrict its traffic down to very specific protocols and endpoints.

Wildcard7

I can't help but wonder about the odds of any data being backed up from any of these machines...