[Solved] Network Shares Between Two XP VMs

[mjr161]

I run two Windows XP VMs on Mac Leopard, and I need to be able to share folders between the two VMs and can't seem to figure out how. With the default NAT enabled both VMs appear to be assigned the same IP address looking at ipconfig which I find odd, and when I enable bridge mode on both they get different IPs, but still can't ping each other. Any ideas?

I just switched over from Fusion and Parallels, and although VB seems to be a little unpolished from the user standpoint compared to the other two.... the performance in Seamless mode is amazing!!! I can't wait to see this product get smoothed out over time, it's amazing.

[baf]

When you where in bridged mode had you disabled the firewalls in your guests?

[mjr161]

I don't have any 3rd party firewalls installed, is there something I have to disable within XP SP3?

[baf]

Yes the builtin firewall. You will either have do disable it or program it to all your computers access.

[mjr161]

Oh, so you have to turn off Windows Firewall? That's odd, I never had to do that with Parallels or Fusion.

I'd rather not turn it off completely for obvious reasons, can someone explain to me how to punch a hole in it to allow XP network shares?

[baf]

Its in the control panel-> windows firewall

And at least ping is blocked by default unless I misremember.
File sharing is under exceptions and ping is found under advanced/ICMP (allow incoming echo request)

But I would recommend you to configure two network cards per guest. One in nat mode so they can reach internet. And one in host only mode.
This gives your host and guests full access to each other. On these intefaces (possibly the hosts too) you would turn off the firewall completely. That is safe becuse outside can't reach it at all.

[mjr161]

Its in the control panel-> windows firewall

And at least ping is blocked by default unless I misremember.
File sharing is under exceptions and ping is found under advanced/ICMP (allow incoming echo request)

But I would recommend you to configure two network cards per guest. One in nat mode so they can reach internet. And one in host only mode.
This gives your host and guests full access to each other. On these intefaces (possibly the hosts too) you would turn off the firewall completely. That is safe becuse outside can't reach it at all.

Couldn't I also just change them to bridged mode and punch out the hole for file sharing?

[baf]

Yes but then you will get into problems next time you want to do something different over the network.
Also If you do it as I suggested then it's done in such a way that even if you do something wrong with firewall settings your machines are still safe.
It's your choice.

[mjr161]

Yes but then you will get into problems next time you want to do something different over the network.
Also If you do it as I suggested then it's done in such a way that even if you do something wrong with firewall settings your machines are still safe.
It's your choice.

Ok, so I followed your advice and setup Network card 1 as Nat and card 2 as host only, as well as enabled file and printer sharing on the one VM in the Windows Firewall settings. Now the network shares work, but is there anything else I need to configure?

[baf]

Well I would open the firewall and under advanced uncheck the "internal" network card.
Then the firewall is completely off for that card.

[mjr161]

I'm still a little confused on which adapter is doing which. I have two, one with a 192.168.x.x address and one with a 10.0.x.x address. Which card is being used to access the internet/external resources and which one is being used to access the other VM. I'm assuming the 192 is the one for the internet.

If this is the case, what exactly does the 10.0.x.x card have access to? Just resources on the host computer? If so, can it get internet access from the the 10.0 card somehow? I wonder this becuase the firewall to the 10.0 card is turned off now.

[baf]

In nat mode (the 10.0.... address) you are already protected by virtualbox. On the card with 192.168.56.* only your guest and host exists.
So you could disable the firewall completely now.

Your guests will use the 10.0.2.15 address to connect to your host(possibly) and internet via VirtualBox nat-engine.
And this will only let answers to a guests query to come in.

[mjr161]

Got everything working, tyvm