How to get laptop to see desktop and its resources?

Mika: How to get laptop to see desktop and its resources?
I bought a laptop and am trying to make it so that I can share files between the desktop and the laptop, and also print from the laptop directly to the printer that’s connected to the desktop.

I had a working LAN already with the printer sharing working fine.

Here is the setup:

A cable modem, connected to a linksys router, which has wifi enabled but also is connected via ethernet cable to the desktop PC (windows xp). The laptop (Vista) can connect to the wireless network just fine but cannot see the desktop and therefore use any of its resources. The router assigns IPs to both comps just fine w/ dhcp and both comps can get online. Just can’t talk to each other for some reason.

Answers and Views:

Answer by SteveZman
all you need is to be in the same workgroup, file & print sharing enabled, then share a folder, nay folder, make one if you want and share it. asl long as there are no firewalls, it should work.
Try browsing to the local PC under my computer and seeing if that works

Answer by DarkHardwoood
What you’ll need to do is download “Link Layer Topology Discovery Responder” to your comp that has XP. That is the only way you’ll get the two comps to network together.

Here’s the link for the download:

Overview
This package contains the Link Layer Topology Discovery (LLTD) responder. The network map on a computer running Windows Vista shows a graphical view of the computers and devices on your network and how they are connected by using the LLTD protocol. The LLTD responder must be installed on a computer running Windows XP before it can be detected and appear on the network map. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer.