Link to home
Start Free TrialLog in
Avatar of RTSol
RTSol

asked on

Virtual PC network

Hi,
I have a laptop running Vista Business with a WS 2008 istalled in Virtual PC. When my laptop is connected to a network everything works just fine. However, when I am disconnected from the network the server and the laptop don't see each other. How can I set up my system so I can access my server from my laptop even if I am not connected to any network. It would be great since I am demonstrating SharePoint for customers and there is not allways a network available - ran into that today.
Best regards
RTSol
Avatar of lamaslany
lamaslany
Flag of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland image

Most new laptops disable the NIC if it is not plugged in as a power-saving feature.  Have you tried dis-allowing the aut-disabling of a disconnected NIC?

Avatar of RTSol
RTSol

ASKER

Hi,
I must admit that this is not any expertese of mine. I unchecked the checkbox as shown in the attched document. However when I unplug the power cable it still disconnects the network adapter. Also, if I disconnect the wireless I have the same problem as before. Maybe I got it all wrong. Can you help me?
Best regards
RTSol
NIC.docx
Does your laptop have any third-party power management tools?  I seem to remember at least Dell's XPS range shipping with a power-management utility that seemed to over-ride the Windows settings...
Avatar of RTSol

ASKER

I don't know - I have a HP 6530b. How do you find out?
Even if the NIC was not disabled by power managemment tools, when its status is "Media Disconnected" you will not be able to use it for sure. I have never come across a situation where cable is disconnected and still we are able to pass the data through it.

I am not sure if what lamaslany says will be an exception to what I said.

To work around this, you can create a loopback adapter on Vista and connect your VM to that when ever you disconnect the laptop from the network.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Avatar of Gary Case
Gary Case
Flag of United States of America image

Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Avatar of RTSol

ASKER

Hi garycase,
You are right - this is the way to go. I found this post by Dave who is doing exactly what I want to do. I downloaded devcon and installed the loop back adaptor. Now I just need to configure it. I must admit that I dont know exactly how to do that. I now have three loacal area connectors: Local area connector, wireless network connector and Local area connector 3 - which is the loop back connector. I need to have static IP addresses according to Dave. The question is in what way. Shall all the connections have the same IP or should the loop back connector have a different one - or maybe a different network? My first two have the IP 192.168.0.13. If I give that to the loop back connector it starts searching for a network and finds an unidentified network and no connection with the server is esatblished. The servers IP is 192.168.0.32. What shall I do?
Best regards
RTSol
You don't need DevCon to install the loopback adapter -- although if you used it to do so that should be okay [Did you try simply doing it directly with the Add Hardware wizard?? ... works fine].

The loopback is just another network adapter -- no need to use static IP's as long as you have a DHCP server on your network -- e.g. your WS2008 machine (if it's configured that way).   But if the server's not set as a DHCP host you should be able to simply set both the server and your client (the host PC in this case) to use a static IP with that adapter and all should be well.   You DO have to be sure you're using that network & not one of your other two.   Getting Vista to use the correct network can be tricky when there are multiple networks installed -- I'm by no means an expert at this, but have found that a bit of "fiddling" with the Vista Network & Sharing center can usually fix it :-)
Avatar of RTSol

ASKER

I am sorry - I have only the loop back network - the wireless is not connected and no cable is plugged. Still no connection whith my server. It is set up like this:
Laptop
IP: 192.168.0.13
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Nothing else
Server
IP: 192.168.0.32
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Nothing else
What am I doing wrong?
Are they both using the loopback adapter as their NIC?   You have to change the settings in Virtual PC to select that adapter.
Avatar of RTSol

ASKER

Thanks a lot,
You solved my problem. I needed to add this network to virtual PC - had overlooked that :-). Now it works very good and I can develop against my server off line - perfect. I really learned a lot about networks doing this - thanks for your patience.
Best regards
RTSol