On 02/10/2013 16:59, Terry Coles wrote:
On Wednesday 02 Oct 2013 14:54:00 d-...@hadrian-way.co.uk wrote:
Guys,
I have a very strange networking problem here at work and cannot see the
wood for the trees. The OT bit is that the VMs are Windows XP guests
running in Virtual PC (XPMode) on Windows 7 hosts. However, the problem is
relating to being able to ping between guests and (sometimes) from hosts to
guests. is there anyone who is network / VM savvy enough to suggest an
avenue to explore?
Here is the setup:
* 3-off standard Dell desktop PCs running Windows 7 Professional.
* 1-off standard Dell desktop PC running Kali Linux Live Disc.
* The three PCs are networked together using a cheapo Netgear Switch FS108.
(I have also tried a 3-Com hub.)
* All physical computers are allocated static IP addresses in the
192.168.0.* range with a netmask of 255.255.255.0.
* Each of the three desktop PCs are hosting an almost identical VM running
XP professional. The only difference between the three XP instances are
hostname and IP address (in the same range as the hosts). There are some
applications that are configured differently on each guest, but I don't
believe that they have any bearing on the problem because I can shut them
down with the same result.
* This network is completely private and Firewalls are off in all hosts and
guests.
Here is what happens when I ping each machine:
* All the hosts ping each other OK.
* One of the guests (no 3) can always ping one of the other guests, but
generally not both.
* Guest No 1 can never ping Guest No 2 and vice versa, but both can usually
ping Guest No 3.
* The hosts running Guests 1 2 also have trouble pinging the guest on the
other machine.
* The above results are variable.
If I use nmap from the fourth machine running Linux I also get variable
results: * Usually all XP guests show around 5 or 6 ports open, but this
does vary. * All W7 hosts show the same dozen or so ports open.
* Sometimes one of the guests shows up as having all of its ports filtered.
Small update. Just before I left work today, we ran continuous pings from all
of the hosts to
all of the guests, vice versa and all of the hosts to all of the hosts (instead
of the four pings
and stop which Windows usually does). Behaviour was pretty much as described,
but then
some of the working pings began to time out occasionally and then more often.
If we
temporarily disconnected an ethernet cable at the switch, or temporarily
powered the switch
down, things improved for a while, although we never got Guests 1 and 2 to talk
together.
We could get a similar effect by disabling the network connection temporarily.
Terry.
Are there DNS issues?
local host file of the Linux m/c, VM names missing? -
Add name, fully qualified name, correct IP addr etc.
File Print sharing needs to be opened on the VM firewall.
Cheers,
Phil.
--
P.Lane
Poole
Dorset
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