Question

Windows workgroup computer requests password for shares

Asked by: Labsy

Hi,

I faced a very annoying issue in a small WORKGROUP.

SITUATION
There are 6 Windows XP workstations in the office.
They are in simple WORKGROUP named "WORKGROUP".
Every user has "My Documents" folder shared for everybody else.
Quite simple.

WHAT WAS CHANGED
They asked me to rename all computers, because COMPUTER NAMES were old, named by previous employees, which are not there anymore. So I renamed, for example, copmuter named "Joe" to "George", "Mary" to "Joshua" and so on.
Then I removed all old SHORTCUSTS to favourites "My network places", so all new shortcuts were new.
That's all I did.

NOW, THE PROBLEM
Ever since this change, 4 of computers are OK, but the other 2 have problems.
Actually, when you browse FROM any of those 4 computers into WORKGROUP, you see ALL computers, listed by NEW names. That's OK.
But you can open only 4 computers to see their shares, while on 2 computers you cannot browse them.

WEIRD
When you click on either of these 2 computers in WORKGROUP, you get prompt for USERNAME and PASSWORD, but you can type in anything, but it does not work!!
Why is there prompt for username and password? Shares are opened for "Everyone", so it should let you in. Any why it does NOT accept any password?

WHAT I TRIED TO SOLVE:
- checked "Simple file sharing", set it to ENABLE and to DISABLE, but in neither case it helped
- cleared ARP table on all computers, ARP -d
- cleared DNS CACHE on all computers, IPCONFIG /flushdns
- cleared WINS cache on all computers, NBTSTAT -rR
- changed DHCP automatic IP to static, and to another IP
- removed "Client for Windows networking" and "File and printer sharing" protocols from TCP/IP, and reinstalled them back after reboot
- removed network adapter from device manager, and installed it back after reboot
- tried to access computer via IP \\192.168.1.117\ or via NetBIOS name \\Joshua\ but nothing works
- I uninstalled NOD32 antivirus, rebooted, but nothing
- stopped and disabled WINDOWS FIREWALL, but no help
- I created new folder, and created new \\SHARE...but still nothing
- I checked SHARE and NTFS permissions on shared folders, but no, nothing
- all computers are on XP SP2

I am out of ideas.
It was all working fine before I renamed the computer.
Any idea how to enable SHARES again?

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Asked On
2009-08-27 at 12:17:25ID24687797
Tags

shared folders

,

windows XP

,

networking

,

workgroup

Topics

Windows XP Operating System

,

WINS

,

Net BIOS and NetBEUI

Participating Experts
2
Points
500
Comments
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Answers

 

by: dfkePosted on 2009-08-27 at 12:38:07ID: 25201811

Are they cloned workstations?

 

by: dfkePosted on 2009-08-27 at 12:41:30ID: 25201845

If so then they have the same Computer Security Identifier (SID). Run newsid on those workstations. You can run it anyways just to make sure and see if it solves you problem.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897418.aspx

 

by: Spec01Posted on 2009-08-27 at 12:53:45ID: 25201996

Have you made sure that the Share Permissions are the same access as the Security permissions? If you have not set the share permissions properly they will not get access.

 

by: Spec01Posted on 2009-08-27 at 12:56:06ID: 25202027

If you are asked for a username and password when clicking on the shared folders did you type localcomputername\username? have you tried to type in the localcomputer\administrator credentials of the computer you are connecting to?

 

by: LabsyPosted on 2009-08-27 at 13:21:38ID: 25202278

Hi...thanx for suggestions.

I'll try SID Changer tomorrow, since I am not at location today. Will report back.

Regarding SHARE permissions:
- under SHARE permissions, I put "Everyone" with full access
- under NTFS permissions, I put "Users" full access and "Everyone" read permissions.
 
Regarding username and password, I tried all these:
- username and password,
- COMPUTERNAME\username and password,
- administrator and password,
- Guest and empty,
but none of combination did work.

Also strange:
- if I ENABLE "Simple file sharing" on problematic target computers, I get username and password prompt with greyed-out "COMPUTERNAME\Guest" in username field, so I can only enter password (or leave it empty). I tried everything, also enabled "Guest" userr on target computer, but did not work.
- but if I DISABLE "Simple file sharing", I get the same prompt for username and password, but both fields are empty

 

by: LabsyPosted on 2009-08-28 at 10:29:28ID: 25209806

Problem solved!

What I did:
- first I run NewSID as DFKE suggested.
- reboot
- then I disabled Simple file sharing (windows explorer -> Tools -> Folder options -> View)
- then run Internet connection wizard (or file sharing wizard)

On one PC it worked imidiatelly, but on 2nd, I had to repeat above steps in mixed order, until all bugs were extincted and WORKGROUP is now working fine.

Thanx for help.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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