Shared drive only appearing for some computers

[sharpnova]

So I have three computers plugged into the same modem. (motorola's surfboard for TWC)

I have an external USB 3.0 24 TB drive plugged into one of the computers.

I went to 'My Computer', right clicked the external drive, went to sharing and shared the drive read-only.

One of the other two computers can see this drive. Though I have to login with MY login information on that computer.

The other computer didn't see it.

So I tried the horrendous: Security tab -> Edit -> Add -> Advanced -> Find Now -> Everyone deal.

So when I applied this, it started scanning through the drive and setting security permissions file by file.

I wasn't kidding when I said this was a 24 TB drive. So that would take hours. And it is a horrible solution because when more media gets added to this drive, I'll have to come back here and run the whole process again?

Why on earth isn't sharing the drive just having it pop up on the computer's network?

And why do I have to login with MY credentials on the computer that does see the drive?

All computers are running 64-bit Windows 7.

 

[chev65]

You really should only be sharing from the C:>Users folder rather than the C: drive itself.

If you had a Homegroup set up that might prevent other machines not in the Homegroup from seeing the drive.

Once the folders are shared you shouldn't have to go through the process again, although you should have set that up through the Users folder rather than the C: drive per the link below.
http://www.sevenforums.com/network-sharing/92521-hdd-sharing.html#post798310

Not sure about the credentials but it may help to turn off password protected sharing in the Advanced Sharing Settings.

 

[sharpnova]

Please explain what you mean by sharing form the C:>Users folder.

I am not sharing my boot drive. And I'm not sharing a folder, I'm sharing a drive.

I never setup a Homegroup, but I checked on the computer that can't see the drive properly and it says it *is* in a homegroup, so that shouldn't be an issue, correct?

Again what do you mean by the Users folder? I'm trying to share a drive.

I went to advanced sharing settings and Password Protected Sharing was *off*.

And what do you mean I wouldn't have to go through the process again? The process was iterating through every single folder/file on the drive. If it's doing that that means if I add more folders/files I'd have to do the process again.

I don't want to do that process. I simply want to share the drive.

Do you think I'm trying to share a folder in the C:\Users folder? This is not the case. I am trying to share an external drive.

Please help.. but please provide help specific to the question I asked.

 

[chev65]

Please explain what you mean by sharing form the C:>Users folder.

I am not sharing my boot drive. And I'm not sharing a folder, I'm sharing a drive.

I never setup a Homegroup, but I checked on the computer that can't see the drive properly and it says it *is* in a homegroup, so that shouldn't be an issue, correct?

Again what do you mean by the Users folder? I'm trying to share a drive.

I went to advanced sharing settings and Password Protected Sharing was *off*.

And what do you mean I wouldn't have to go through the process again? The process was iterating through every single folder/file on the drive. If it's doing that that means if I add more folders/files I'd have to do the process again.

I don't want to do that process. I simply want to share the drive.

Do you think I'm trying to share a folder in the C:\Users folder? This is not the case. I am trying to share an external drive.

Please help.. but please provide help specific to the question I asked.

The C:>Users folder is where Windows sets the sharing permissions by default, there are plenty of good reasons for this, not to mention sharing from the root of the C: drive is considered a security risk so is not advised for this reason.

If only one machine is in a Homegroup this can prevent shares from being accessed by other machines in the Workgroup so this can present some problems. You simply need to leave the Homegroup on that one machine in order to see if this was causing a problem or not. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/43980-homegroup-leave.html

External drive or not, the default for Windows is to share from the C:>Users folder and not the C: drive itself. I believe this is explained in the link I posted earlier.

 

[sharpnova]

I don't see how this helps me?

I'm trying to share a drive. To do so I went to My Computer, right clicked the drive and set it to be shared.

Why would I need to navigate into my Users folder to share a drive?

And can you please help me with my issue?

 

[chev65]

I don't see how this helps me?

I'm trying to share a drive. To do so I went to My Computer, right clicked the drive and set it to be shared.

Why would I need to navigate into my Users folder to share a drive?

And can you please help me with my issue?

I just did help and explained the reason for this.

It's also very likely that Windows will have a hard time seeing drives bigger than 2TB unless they are partitioned by using GPT per the link below.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2581408

 

[sharpnova]

I don't understand your explanation. Could you please elaborate.

Why is right clicking the drive and enabling sharing not working? Keep in mind I am *not* trying to share the C: drive. It is an external USB drive.

 

[sharpnova]

I believe the issue here may be that you think I am trying to share a folder that is within my users folder. I am trying to share an entire drive. It is not the C: drive. It happens to be the E: drive.

 

[VistaKing]

Go to Network and Sharing Center, on your computer you want to share
Network discovery is ON
File and Printer sharing is ON
Not sure but you might want to turn Password Protected sharing off,

 

[sharpnova]

Oh and also, none of the computers have a problem recognizing this drive. I have had this plugged into every one of the computers individually at one time or another and they had no trouble recognizing/reading/writing the drive whatsoever.

 

[VistaKing]

Did you add everyone in the Security tab ?

All pcs should be on the same network and home group

 

[sharpnova]

Go to Network and Sharing Center, on your computer you want to share
Network discovery is ON
File and Printer sharing is ON
Not sure but you might want to turn Password Protected sharing off,

There are two dropdowns in Network and Sharing Center -> Advanced sharing settings

Home or Work

and

Public



network discover and file and printer sharing are ON on both of them
and password protected is OFF on both of them.

this is the case on this computer and both of the other two computers on the network.

 

[chev65]

I believe the issue here may be that you think I am trying to share a folder that is within my users folder. I am trying to share an entire drive. It is not the C: drive. It happens to be the E: drive.

Suggest you study the information and required steps in the link to establish a GPT partition table so that Windows can use this 24TB drive.

Windows support for hard disks that are larger than 2 TB

 

[sharpnova]

Did you add everyone in the Security tab ?

All pcs should be on the same network and home group

How exactly would one add someone in the Security tab?

The only options are:

Everyone
Authenticateed Users
SYSTEM
Administrators (<name>\Administrators)
Users (<name>\Users)

replace <name> with the name of the computer that is trying to share the drive.

Those are listed under "Group or user names:"

when i click them they show checks next to the Read & execute and List folder contents options in the window below.

 

[sharpnova]

I believe the issue here may be that you think I am trying to share a folder that is within my users folder. I am trying to share an entire drive. It is not the C: drive. It happens to be the E: drive.

Suggest you study the information and required steps in the link to establish a GPT partition table so that Windows can use this 24TB drive.

Windows support for hard disks that are larger than 2 TB

As I explained, all computers on this network have had no trouble using this drive.

 

[chev65]

I believe the issue here may be that you think I am trying to share a folder that is within my users folder. I am trying to share an entire drive. It is not the C: drive. It happens to be the E: drive.

Suggest you study the information and required steps in the link to establish a GPT partition table so that Windows can use this 24TB drive.

Windows support for hard disks that are larger than 2 TB

As I explained, all computers on this network have had no trouble using this drive.

If that is the case then what are you trying to fix?

 

[sharpnova]

I am trying to share a drive so that other computers on the network can see it.

Currently out of the three computers on the network, one of them is the computer into which the drive is plugged directly. One of them can access it, but I have to enter my username/password from the first computer first, the third does not see it.

The drive works fine when I plug it in, individually, (as I explained) into any of these computers.

The formatting/partitioning of the drive is fine.

 

[sharpnova]

I've felt like there is a language barrier here from the start, since you kept insisting on sharing from a particular folder. I am trying to share a drive, via an Operating System. Not share a folder.. via a folder.

If there is any more information I can provide for troubleshooting, please let me know.

 

[sharpnova]

I don't want to cause any confusion here so I'll try and keep it short....

When applying security permissions you need to make sure that it is set to allow 'This folder,subfolder and files'. This will apply the permissions you set for the current data on that drive and any future added data. For example, I added the user - [email protected] to this drive and ensured that the permission entry applied to everything on this drive and anything stored on this drive in the future:

View attachment 281940

View attachment 281939

Yes, it will take a while for it to complete applying the security permission entry however you are applying it to every single file. You may wish to slipstream this by changing the applying to 'This Folder and Subfolders'. Please note that this may have undesired consequences in the future.

View attachment 281942

Also, your share may be hidden depending on what is shared so you may need to put a '$' in front of the drive letter.

For example, to access my F:\ drive I would enter the following UNC path:

\\Server-1\F$

View attachment 281943

Hope this helps,
Josh

This is a big part of what I don't understand.

Why can't I just share the drive? Why do I have to go into security settings and have a permissions function iterate through all the folders? That seems like a very messy solution. One of the computers sees the drive perfectly well when all I did was share it.

I just want to do it this way because this is the simple and straightforward way. And I am trying to understand why it is giving me trouble.

 

[chev65]

Your last statement contradicts the previous one as it's obvious that at least one machine doesn't have access at all.

From what I have read about drives bigger than 2TB, you may be able to see the drive but won't be able to use more than 2TB. This according to the link I posted earlier.

It sounds like the credential requirement may be built into the drive's security settings although you may be able to get around that by making adjustments to the Local Security Policy's of each machine.

Try these settings to see if they make a difference.

Control Panel - Administrative Tools - Local Security Policy

Local Policies - Security Options

Network security: LAN Manager authentication level
Set to Send LM & NTLM responses only

Set the Minimum session security for NTLM SSP
Disable Require 128-bit encryption

The screen shots below should be helpful.

Reboot all machines after making the adjustment.