The Ecommerce Workshop

Try the steps below as we will see if your laptop can FTP:

1. Make sure that your Port 21 is open in your Vista Firewall.
2. Check to see if you can connect to the server using the active mode.
3. Open up the command prompt
4. Type ftp (lowercase) and press enter
5. type open sitename.com and then press enter
6. Enter your name and password when asked
7. Type dir and then press enter. If you can then see the directory structure of the FTP server then you know that you can connect.
8. Type close and press enter
9. Type quit and press enter
10. Change settings in IE 7 (I have only tested this fix with IE7)
11. Under the Advanced tab in IE Tools\Options
12. IMPORTANT: Uncheck the “Use Passive FTP (for firewall and DSL modem…) checkbox
13. Check the “Enable FTP folder view (outside of Internet Explorer” checkbox

Mapping FTP drives
This may be slightly non-intuitive too. You have to map a drive to the FTP server in order to preserve the settings of the server.

Open Windows Explorer
Choose Tools\Map Network Drive menu
Click the “Connect to a Web site that you can use… ” link.
Follow the instructions…

I have assumed you are using windows vista (if not, you can buy it here and save over £10 on the upgrade) if not, let me know….