Cannot share folders after resetting router

[hubbalicious]

I'm on an Actiontec MI-424-WR router and have been sharing folders/files on my main pc to three other pc's in the house (let's call them Bedroom, Laptop, and Living Room).  The main pc runs Win7 and the three others run Win7, Vista, and XP.  The shared folders/files include music, videos, and pictures.  I've had no issues until last night when I reset the router.

I reset the router by unplugging for 30 seconds.  After the router came back online, I can no longer see the main pc from any of the other three pc's, nor can I see any other pc's from the main pc. The interesting thing is that when I use the "Test Connectivity" function in the router software, the test passes.  Pinging thru a dos command seems to work, I get 4 packets sent and 4 packets received, but I also get an error message "Reply from 192.168.1.x Destination host unreachable", with 192.168.1.x being the pc that I'm pinging from.  Pinging thru the router software fails.

The only change to my setup was resetting the router last night. The sharing worked fine right before resetting and stopped working right after resetting. So this is obviously an issue with the router.  I suspected some settings I had tweaked a year ago when I first set up the router may have been reset to default, but everything I checked looks like it is still at my manual settings.

Does anyone have any idea what the problem might be???

[somegirl]

If you weren't having any problems, why did you unplug the router? ("Reset" is the wrong term to use here, as it implies use of the reset button.)

Just gathering information for the wonderful people who will be along shortly to solve your problem. 😉

[hubbalicious]

actually, after trying to fix for a few hours before posting last night, i did press the reset button.  but my manual settings still seem to be unchanged.

to clarify, i wasn't having major problems, but once in a while i would have a minor issue.  when watching a movie on one of the secondary pc's, the video would freeze for a few seconds, then start again, then freeze again, etc.  would do this with any video, small or large and essentially make it unwatchable.  the next day, or even later that day, things would be fine again.  i finally got fed up with the freezing the other day and figured i'd try "resetting" (unplugging) the router to see if that would help.  i guess i should have left good enough alone.

[smith6612]

Try turning off every device that connects to your network (Do not use the sleep mode!), and then power cycling the router. From there, turn on your main PC and then turn on each device individually. See if you're able to use File Sharing again. In addition, check over the firewalls on your PC to make sure they weren't set to block Windows File Sharing for whatever reason. Unless of course, you tried this already...

[hubbalicious]

well, whaddya know. i thought i'd try one last time before heading to work, and i can now access the shared files from my bedroom pc.  i'll test the other pc's when i get back from work tonight and report back.

re your suggestions, i did turn off the main pc before hitting the reset button last night, but not the other pc's and i did try turning off the firewall but this did not help. 

i guess these suggestions are moot now, but thanks to everyone for the help.  i'll confirm later tonight that everything is working.

[viafax999 · Accepted solution]

For some reason it takes several hours for all the machines toe reappear in the router's dns.  In the interim you can get to the shares via the ip address that the shares are on.

[hubbalicious]

i tried accessing thru the ip address but that did not work.  believe me, i tried everything i could think of before posting here.

but i tested all the pc's and it looks like everything is working just fine now. thanks again to everyone for the help!