My Network: All Same Workgroup, Each Computer a Unique Name, Private Network.
#1 Vista Ultimate x64 Desktop Wireless. Win firewall ON, Guest Account OFF,
Discovery ON, File Sharing ON, Public OFF, Print Sharing ON, Password Protect
ON, Media OFF (for now). 2 USB Printers and 2 External USB Drives attached
and shared. One User account added with exact same name and login as laptop
#2.

#2 WinXP Pro Laptop Wireless, Win Firewall ON, guest OFF, LLTD Installed,
Account on Vista Machine.

#3 WinXP Pro Desktop Wired, same settings as Laptop, no account on Vista
machine. This machine is used as a file server with attached 1TB External
Drive as a mapped drive specific to this machine and shared. It has no
access to #1 or #2, it's a dumb box.

The Observation:
When going to My Network Places on the laptop, sometimes the files and
folders on the Vista machine are not listed. I click "View Workgroup
Computers" and the Vista machine is there, I click it and get a login box,
where I put my laptop log info, and all shares on the Vista show up. I can
then go back to just the My Network Places window, and the Vista machine
shows up after a few seconds, along with all its shared components. The
network works perfectly, other than that one glitch. All files, printers and
drives that are shared are accessible from the Vista & Laptop along with the
1TB drive that is shared and mapped to #3.

NOTE: The network did not work at all with Password Protected Sharing OFF.