Problem with mapped network drive at startup

[hoyhoy]

Situation:
I recently put in a network in my house. There are two computers, one is running XP Professional and the other is running 2000 Professional. I can ping from either machine and all is well. I also set up a NetGear RP614 Router with built-in switch. I am treating the 2000 Professional machine as the server with the entire Local C Drive shared.
On the XP Professional machine, I have a network drive called Z mapped to the C drive on the 2000 Pro machine. Upon creating the mapped network drive I checked off the reconnect at logon box.

Problem:
Each morning when I first turn on the PC and boot up, I cannot open any applications from the shortcuts on my desktop without first double-clicking on the network drive Z. Only then does everything work.

Why?
Why do I have to double-click on the network drive Z on the XP Professional machine before I can open any applications from the shortcuts on the desktop?

 

[TSSTechie]

Hi

Did you put a password on the share on your Win 2K machine. If so, you will need to make your XP machine rmember this password else it can't connect. This is the only situation I have ever seen this.

Hope this helps

 

[smah]

The only time that I have seen this condition is when the 'server' machine has gone into standby or has otherwise left the network. As a test, before starting the XP machine, run chkdsk on the 2k machine to make sure it's "awake".

 

[hoyhoy]

To TSSTECHIE & SMAH,

TSSTECHIE - To check if there is a password on the Local C Drive that's shared out on the 2000 machine, do you right click on the C drive and click sharing and look at the permissions?

SMAH - Thanks. I will give that a try.

 

[Designware]

Hi,

I was wondering if there was ever a resolution to this issue? I have exactly the same issue. It's an XP machine A that is mapping a drive on another XP machine B. Everything is fine until I reboot XP machine A (B is continually on during this time). On reboot, it loses the network connection (red X on drive mapping). There is not password protection on the share, and I have tried swapping out network cards as suggested above.

Please, anyone have a resolution to this problem ?

Thank you.

Dale

 

[bcastner]

Mapped Network Drives Are Not Connected After You Restart Your Computer
This article was previously published under Q283492

SYMPTOMS
After you restart your computer, some of your previously mapped network drives may not reconnect.

CAUSE
This behavior can reduce the time that is needed for Windows XP to start. During the logon process, attempts are made to restore only the mapped network drives that do not require any credentials to be provided by the user. If one or more network drives are not reconnected after you log on, a yellow balloon tip on the bottom right of the desktop appears to notify you that not all of the network drives were reconnected.

STATUS
This behavior is by design.

MORE INFORMATION
If you click the yellow balloon tip on the bottom right of the desktop or open My Computer, the drive icon appears with a red X on it, and is labeled as disconnected. To reconnect it, double-click the icon, and you will be prompted for the password that corresponds to the user name you used when you originally mapped the drive.

Source:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;283492&Product=winxp

****************
My comment. Use Group Policy to change the logon from asynchronous to synchronous with your network.

See my FAQ on Windows XP connectivity issues, the final paragraph on enabling synchronous startup under Group Policy: faq779-4017

 

[bcastner]

See also:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;303560&Product=winxp

Clearing Existing Shortcuts from My Network Places

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Taskbar & Start Menu.
Click the Advanced tab.
Click Clear to remove records of recently used documents, programs, and Web sites.
Click OK.

Personally I have had better luck making shortcuts point to fully qualified UNC paths, rather than to mapped drive letters.

 

[sekshin8]

Hi,
I had this problem on all of my XP machines but I think I just found a workaround. I created a shortcut to the mapped network drives and placed them in the "Startup" folder. After restarting the machine, the boot time was much much longer. There was a long pause while the background picture was displayed just before the icons showed up on the screen. After the boot completes you will see a new window opened up for each network drive shortcut you placed in the "Startup" folder. I wouldn't recommend this workaround if you reboot your computer often.

 

[sekshin8]

Hi again,
It was working on every reboot until I uninstalled the Netware client. Now the shortcuts don't work but it's definately worth a try. Good luck.