HP MediaVault Issues With Norton Internet Security

Posted by Anandhan Subbiah on Nov 22, 2006 in Cool Products, Technical Articles • 2 comments

I recently purchased a 300GB HP MediaVault . I ran the installer in my HP PC which was running Microsoft XP Home edition. I was not able to use the software which came with the bundle as the Home edition does not support networking but it allowed mapping network drives though . I was never able to map the mediavault drive as my computer was not able to see it . I checked the user guide for HP Mediavault and it said that i should disable the firewall when i use the Vault. It was a big surprise to me that a leading PC manufacturer like HP wanted it’s customers to turn off the firewall . Security is compromised these days even with firewalls hence disabling it seemed like a really bad idea to me.

I was using Norton Personal Firewall 2003 as my software firewall . I tried modifying the rules in Norton Personal Firewall 2003 and even though i granted complete access to the hpmediavault server it kept blocking it . The only way i could ever map a drive was when i disabled the firewall. Then I went one step further and uninstalled it. I have comcast cable so i downloaded Mcafee Personal Firewall for free and then i was able to connect without any issues . Mcafee configures the access rules as it allows certain IP addresses ( i believe it is all the machines in my network or connected to my router).

Norton Internet Security 2007 is much better . It did not allow access initially but once i configured the new rules ( It did not configure itself like Mcafee) it followed the rules faithfully .

I would recommend anyone using HP Mediavault to configure their firewall and not to ever disable it as recommended in forums and the user guides.

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2 comments

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  1. Luca Zaramella on Jul 26, 2007, 3:34 pm:

    I am facing the same issues. Despite giving the IP address of the HP Media Vault to Norton Security Center, the access to the media vault keeps on being an issue. Any hints you can offer?
    Thanks,
    Luca

  2. Anandhan Subbiah on Jul 26, 2007, 6:39 pm:

    You can modify Norton Security Center to allow a certain range of IP address’s. Specify the Ip address as “Allowed” in the network locations and you should be able to use the media vault.

    You can modify the firewall program rules and allow complete access to HP Media Center
    Something like “All exe files under Hp Media vault should have unrestricted access”

    Let me know if this does not work.

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