Can't share Won't share

I recently purchased a new desktop with windows 7 on and i am trying to network with our other pc which has windows XP on.I'm on a home group and can see and access public files only when trying to network my windows 7 pc.I have tried everything from all the forums about file sharing but i can only see the public files.I also dropped a shortcut in one of the public files to the file I want to share,I could see the shortcut but it couldn't find the file.I don't fancy moving this file into public files as it is very large and sat on my desktop.Can anyone PLEASE HELP,,,

Hi Electricman - Welcome to w7forums

I was having similar troubles until I noticed this setting.

Control Panel >> Network and Internet >> Network and Sharing Center >> Advanced sharing settings

Look for "Password protected sharing" and make sure the option is set to "Turn off password protected sharing"

already done that,but thanks

I've never seen XP play nice in a homegroup scenario.

I have had to set up shared folders that are owned by "Everyone" before just to get them to share thanks to 7's "interesting" new networking ideas.