Windows 7: Can't access other home computers' drives since W7 reinstall.

I recently did a complete reinstall of Windows 7 64-bit on my desktop computer, and now I can't access shared drives on my wife's Windows 7 computer (home ethernet network).

I was able to install and use the shared printer attached to her computer.

I am able to add her shared drives to my Windows Explorer as mapped network drives, but if I click on one an error box pops up: "J:\ is not accessible. Access is denied."



Her computer and all of her drives show up in the Network section of Windows Explorer, but if I click on one, I get a Network Error popup saying "Windows cannot access \\Wife-pc\c. You do not have permission to access \\Wife-pc\c. Contact your network administrator to request access."

I am able to control her desktop and transfer files using UltraVNC...that's actually the only way I can transfer files at the moment.

If, from her computer, I right-click her C: drive, select Properties -> Sharing, it shows the drive is shared. If I click the Advanced Sharing button, and then click the Permissions button, under "Group or user names" it shows "Everyone", and shows the permissions as Full Control, Change, and Read.

What else do I need to do so that I can access her drives as Mapped Network Drives? I was able to do so prior to reinstalling Windows 7 on my computer, and nothing has changed on her computer.

Do you have a homegroup or a workgroup? Do you have the same username/password that you did before you reinstalled Windows?

Homegroup, no. I've done my best to ignore that. Workgroup, yes, default name. Same computer names and passwords.

See if this helps.

File Sharing - Between XP and W7 (and vice versa)?

Did you verify that you aren't in a homegroup? The default behavior for 7 is to have your computer be in a homegroup. If you haven't checked, please do so and make sure you weren't "opted in" to one.

It looks like both computers belong to a homegroup, so I should "leave" them?

I was able to access her C: drive by going into the security settings and again giving "Everyone" full access, although it's still blocking me from major areas like Program Files, ProgramData, Windows, etc.

Seems silly that I have to remove all security just to be able to access it.

The admin shares (C$, D$) are disabled by default, and you can't enable them without some tweaking. That's why you can't get to them. If you need to access her C drive, then create a share for it, but there's no real reason for that IMHO. If you need that kind of access, just remote into the computer.

If you are using a workgroup, then yes you should leave the homegroup on both computers.

Thanks for all the help.