Being that nobody else answered...I'll take a stab at it.


Ok first off, in my humble opinion the network neighborhood feature in Windows is next to USELESS.  I'd rather have someone chisel my teeth out than be forced to use it.  It rarely works right because it relies on a thing called the "Browse Master" which is basically an argument between the computers in the workgroup.  They argue until one says it's master and it makes the complete list of all of the other computers.  The thing that sucks about this is, sometimes TWO (or more) computers think that they are the Browse Master and they don't include each other in the list...which sounds like what is happening to you.

Also, the whole idea of network neighborhood waters down networking so much that it screws with peoples heads.  If you spend just a little bit of time working to understand how to make this work without the workgroup / network neighborhood...you'll be a happy camper.

Just because the computers aren't showing up in network neighborhood does not mean they cannot communicate.  It just means that the browse master is screwed.  So I'm telling you to abandon that whole method of thinking.

Go to one of the computers.  Click start-->run type "CMD" press enter.  This gives you command line.  type "ipconfig /all" make a note of the host name and IP address.  Now go to the other computer and do the same thing.  Use paper if necessary.

Now, from computer#1, and from command line...type ping ip_address_of_computer2 (or you can use the hostname if you want).
get a response?  Yes, you're good.  Now do the same thing from the other computer.  You should get a response.  

If you do not get a response something is either misconfigured, broken or being blocked (by a personal firewall).  If you aren't getting a response, post back and we'll drill into that further.  First thing I'd check is the Windows SP2 firewall (but I don't know what OS you are running )

I realize this is getting to be quite long quite quickly, so I'm going to wrap this up as fast as possible...

The usernames and passwords on both machines should be set to the same and the rights on the files AND SHARES should be granted to that user.

If you logon to computer#1 as "themaster"...computer#2 needs to have an account on it that matches computer#1..same username, same password same group, same logon rights (if you screwed with local security policy) etc.

now, rather than using network neighborhood...right click on "my network places" and choose "map network drive"..

type: \\other_computer\share_name

and you should get into the share.