I have been using a Buffalo LinkStation Pro LS-250GL High Speed NAS Wireless External Hard Drive and all of a sudden I can't network with it. It has worked fine for over a year on my primary XP (SP2) laptop until recently, and 2 other laptops I own (both XP SP2) are currently having no problem accessing the hard drive and its files.
I can actually access the LinkStation Drive through its web interface and I can log in and change settings -- it just won't let me access any files. I can ping the drive and have no problem finding it but it just doesn’t show up as a letter drive. I have no problem with other wireless connections to other devices, just this one.
I have done the following:
• Uninstalled the LinkStation program, then re-installed it
• Downloaded the latest LinkStation firmware
• Deactivated Norton Antivirus
• Turned off Windows Firewall
• Tried to re-map the drive
• Spoke to tech support for LinkStation and Norton – both said it’s a Windows issue
• Used the reset button on the LinkStation; also shut off and re-started it
• Re-booted the laptop several times
I have been in contact with BuffaloTech support as well as Symantec/Norton and both insist that something changed in Windows to cause access problems. I have disabled and re-enabled Norton Antivirus and uninstalled and re-installed the Buffalo LinkStation software and updated their firmware to no avail.
I haven't used the external drive for a month, maybe 2 months, and I don’t know if I could even rollback far enough to a system restore point to see if that would solve the issue.
Any ideas as to why/how this happened? Could it have been a Windows Update that caused a conflict?