I'm A PC; And I'm Irritated

We have three active computers in our household, an HP Core 2Duo desktop with Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit; a Dell Pentium 4 desktop with Windows XP Home, and a Dell Celeron notebook with Windows Vista Home Basic. This is after some upgrading, Frankensteining and shuffling around from our previous home network, which used to be 100% Windows XP.

Now, I've been a "PC" for almost as long as Windows has been around, surely as long as it has been mainstream. I started with version 3.0, and have been a self-taught Windows "guru" through versions 3.1, 3.11 for Workgroups, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 98 SE, Windows Me, Windows XP Home, and Windows XP Business. As the version numbers climbed, I learned new things. Networking has always been a headache, and each new version seemed to add a layer of block-headedness when it came to things the user is "allowed" to do.

Often, a Windows user trying to use network connections (or even just change settings on a stand-alone computer) is confronted with "access denied" type messages. "Ask your network administrator" is a particularly annoying message when there isn't one. Right now, all I'm trying to do is share files and printers across my network, from my Vista Premium machine to my other two computers. And. It. Refuses.

Any attempt to add my printers to the other two computers asks for a login and password, something I do not even have. Sometimes, I can't even access files on the very computer they exist on. I had to monkey my way through the security settings to look at music and pictures right there on the hard drive. Microsoft's changing of their file structure and security have rendered this Windows "Guru" a clumsy fingered moron. So far, I haven't experienced the Windows Vista-itis that so many complain about, except for my lack of understanding about how it works "under the hood."

So, I'm off to the Google to see if I can stumble into some answers. Feel free to leave me some comments if you've found a good guide. Thanks!