My mapped network drive keeps losing password to Win Server 2008 share

mappeddrivewindows-server-2008

We have WinXP machines on a domain which have a mapped network drive to a share on a Server 2008 computer that is not in the domain. The credentials on the share are a local account on the Server 2008 box.

The problem we are having is after a reboot of each computer in the domain, Windows asks for the account password password.

How can we make Windows remember our saved passwords?

Best Answer

For each XP workstation, use a startup batch file script in %userprofile%\Start Menu\Programs\Startup like so:

net use <drive letter>: \\<servername or ip>\<sharename> /USER:<username> <password> /Y

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Windows Server 2008 – Share Not Accessible Troubleshooting

We've seen the same symptoms with Server 2008 network shares running on boxes with older revisions of Symantec anti-virus products. If you have SAV or SEP 11, make sure the box is running the latest Maintenence Release.

Windows Server 2008 – Mapped Drives Not Showing on Workstations

Group Policy Preferences work great on Vista and newer OS. If your environment is all Vista or newer, use Preferences. It's straight forward, easy, and works. Preferences will not work on XP unless you have the XP CSE installed. Even with the CSE many people have reported "issues" with them working reliably. GPP is not available for older OSes than XP SP2.

Edit:
Here's a copy of the MapDrives.vbs script we use. Works flawlessly on WinXP/Vista/7/2003/2008/R2.

' Author: Chris Stone
' Date: 29 MAY 2009  Version: 1.3
' Purpose: Map network drives

On Error Resume Next
Set objNet = CreateObject("WScript.Network")

Public Sub CheckAndMapNetDrive(Letter, Path, Persist)
    'Check if drive letter is already used
    Set colNetDrives = objNet.EnumNetworkDrives
    For i = 0 To colNetDrives.Count - 1 Step 2
        If colNetDrives.Item(i) = Letter Then
            'Drive Letter Exists, Test if it's the same Path
            If colNetDrives.Item(i+1) = Path Then
                'It's the same, no new mapping necessary.
                Exit Sub
            Else
                'It's different, remove old.
                objNet.RemoveNetworkDrive colNetDrives.Item(i)
            End If
        End If
    Next
    'Drive does not exist now, never did or removed.
    objNet.MapNetworkDrive Letter, Path, Persist
End Sub 

CheckAndMapNetDrive "X:", "\\server\share1", True
CheckAndMapNetDrive "Y:", "\\server\share2", True

Best Answer

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Windows Server 2008 – Share Not Accessible Troubleshooting

Windows Server 2008 – Mapped Drives Not Showing on Workstations

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