The following steps can help you narrow down the problem when you cannot get Samba to work.
- 
Restart the smbd and nmbd daemons. Make sure the last two lines of output end with OK.
# /sbin/service smb restart
Shutting down SMB services:                                [  OK  ]
Shutting down NMB services:                                [  OK  ]
Starting SMB services:                                     [  OK  ]
Starting NMB services:                                     [  OK  ]
testparm
 - 
Run testparm to check that the smb.conf file is syntactically correct:
$ testparm
Load smb config files from /etc/samba/smb.conf
Processing section "[homes]"
Processing section "[printers]"
Processing section "[tmp]"
Loaded services file OK.
Server role: ROLE_STANDALONE
Press enter to see a dump of your service definitions
...
If you misspell a keyword in smb.conf, you get an error such as the following:
# testparm
Load smb config files from /etc/samba/smb.conf
Unknown parameter encountered: "workgruop"
Ignoring unknown parameter "workgruop"
...
ping
 - 
Use ping (page 365) from both sides of the connection to make sure the network is up.
net view
 - 
From a Windows command prompt, use net view to display a list of shares available from the server (pb in this example):
C:>net view \\pb
Shared resources at \\pb
pb Samba
Share name   Type   Used as Comment
--------------------------------------------------------------------
MainPrinter  Print           MainPrinter
mark         Disk   (UNC)    Home Directories
tmp          Disk            mgs temp
The command completed successfully.
net use
 - 
Try to map the drive from a Windows command prompt. The following command attempts to mount the share named tmp on pb as drive X:
C:>net use x: \\pb\tmp
The command completed successfully.
nmblookup
 - 
From the server, query the nmbd server, using the special name __SAMBA__ for the server's NetBIOS name. The d 2 option turns the debugger on at level 2, which generates a moderate amount of output:
$ nmblookup -d 2 -B pb __SAMBA__
added interface ip=192.168.0.10 bcast=192.168.0.255
nmask=255.255.255.0
querying __SAMBA__ on 192.168.0.10
Got a positive name query response from 192.168.0.10 ( 192.168.0.10 )
192.168.0.10 __SAMBA__<00>
nmblookup
 - 
From the server, query the nmbd server for the client's NetBIOS name. (The machine named jam is the Windows client.)
$ nmblookup -B jam \*
querying * on 192.168.0.9
192.168.0.9 *<00>
Omit the B jam option to query for all NetBIOS names.
smbclient
 - 
From the server, use smbclient with the L option to generate a list of shares offered by the server:
$ smbclient -L pb
Password:
Domain=[PB] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.0.10-1.fc2]
        Sharename      Type      Comment
        ---------      ----      -------
        tmp            Disk      mgs temp
        IPC$           IPC       IPC Service (pb Samba)
        ADMIN$         IPC       IPC Service (pb Samba)
        MainPrinter    Printer   MainPrinter
        mark           Disk      Home Directories
Domain=[PB] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.0.10-1.fc2]
        Server               Comment
        ---------            -------
        Workgroup            Master
        ---------            -------
        MGS                  TUNAER
nmblookup
 - 
To query for the master browser from the server, run nmblookup with the M option followed by the name of the workgroup:
$ nmblookup -M MGS
querying MGS on 192.168.0.255
192.168.0.8 MGS<1d>