Disconnected network drive problem

Go into the network connections folder in control panel; and make sure the appropriate network connection are shown in here. If they are not you probably have a corrupt network configuration. You can do this anyway, even if you do as it is recoverable if everything goes belly up, althought 99.999% it doesn't.
go into regedit and drill down to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network and in the folder you will see a binary entry for 'Config'. Remember to back up this key before any change (hence why it's a recoverable operation). then delete this config key and restart the computer. See if that cures your problem. If it has made things worse (which it almost certainly shouldn't) restore from your backup.

Hope this is somewhat helpful!

FiL

Also, you might want to disable the automatically search for shared files and printers option on the client computers. This would prevent the OS as well as your login script from attemptin to map to the same drive

SELSupport - This problem is occurring on multiple PC's in the network / domain; so doesn't seem to be a matter of a corrupted network connection on any one PC. Network connections appear fine in the control panel

JacquesKruger - I want my logon script to map the users network drives.  The mapped drives should not be persistent (which is the default behavior for MaNetworkDrive). The mapped drives do work as they should - however in explorer and My Computer they are shown as disconnected and I can not disconnect them unless I reboot.

Still need more help !!

Check [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Network] wich lists the Network connections
You can delete the key you need.

Have you tried my suggestion?

JacquesKruger

I don't really understand your suggestion. You said that disabling automatic search (not sure how to do this) will prevent the OS and my login script from attempting to map the drive.  But

1) I want the login script to map the drive
2) after a reboot and for the first domain login everything works just fine - so it seems like the current OS behavior (search enabled) works OK.  But something goes wrong with the user's second, third etc. logon attempts since the disconnected drive is still there.


This is a really strange problem because the network and drive mapping script have run great for a year, but very recently developed this problem.  It almost seems like XP is trying to persist the network connections, but is unable to do so.

Have you tried writing a logoff script that disconnnects the drives?

JacquesKruger

I considered a logoff script, but since I can't get the drives to disconnect it seemed pointless.  I tried to disconnect using

1) net use * /del
        (result = 'there are no entries in the list')

2) wshNetwork.RemoveNetworkDrive "H:"
        (result = 'this network connection does not exist'

3) Windows explorer - disconnect network drive
     (result = 'the network connection could not be found')

What OS do you use on the client computers?

All clients are XP Pro SP2.

Log Off / Log On with or without restart?

Starting from the point of a fresh boot on the pc, the first time the user logs on everything is OK - meaning that

(sorry - hit the  wrong key)

Starting from a fresh boot on the pc
   - if I logon as the the local (not domain) administrator account I do not have any drives mapped as it should be
   - If I logon as a domain user, the group policy login script runs without errors, the drives are mapped and have the right designation, everything is great


Domain user logs off
   - if I logon as the local administrator, the local admin user has a drive mapped - even though this user doesn't run the group policy login script. this is incorrect
   - if I logon as the domain user for the second or subsequent times, the domain user encounters an error in the login script when it tries to map a drive (already in use); the mapped drive is present, but is described as 'disconnected network drive', the content of the 'disconnected drive' is accessible and works just fine

Stop and restart the workstation service.
It can help to remove these connections

Longbow - the workstation service is stopped and restarted when I reboot, but after a domain user logs on for the second time, the problem re-appears.  I can't stop and restart this service with every logoff.

My suggestion may sound silly (it kind of does to me), but I feel like because this is a network-wide problem and because it used to work fine, that the problem is on the server.  It may or may not work, but try removing the shares from the server and then re-creating them.  If possible, you may also want to reboot the server in between removing the shares and re-creating them.  I wish you luck!

WP

Hi Rockjodo,

I think you're having a well-known problem.
Are you using a drive letter next to (or formerly used for) local drives? (maybe ext USB drive also)
There is a bug when drive letters have been used for local drives and network drives as well.
Please have a look at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/297694/en-us for a workaround.
Hope it will solve your problem. Good luck!

Try adding an if statement to your login script that checks if the drives are listed before attempting to remap them

Still need a solutio for this problem

Jacques: the problem is that you won't get a list, and you can't disconnect it.
Rockjodo: sorry, even MS offers a workaround only. No remedy yet. I have the same bug every day in my Explorer.

Made some research for you and found
some articles that can be related to your problem.

Mapped Network Drives Are Not Released When Cluster Drives Are Brought Back Online :
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;820952

Mapped Drive Connection to Network Share May Be Lost
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;297684

A local disk drive is not available after you connect it when the drive uses the same drive letter as a mapped network drive :
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;830238

Mapped drives do not appear to connect or disconnect in Windows Explorer :
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;812933

User policies are not applied when you log on to a computer that is running Windows 2000 SP4 :
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;823862

Hi there!

Lots of comments here and I will try not to harp on what is already said, but something you state strikes me as the root of your issue...
Twice you mention that logged on as a local machine admin, the mapped drives are still present?

How exactly are you mapping drives in your script?  do you have credentials in the script itself?

I really think that your method of mapping drives that keeps them mapped even if a local machine account is logged on is the problem.

You mention that this is the same on all machines... therefore its a script issue.

** remove the current script from use
** do the reboot and ensure no mapped drives
** create test script and enable for use (however you do that, per account, gpo, etc..)
     test script should be something like this:
     net use <driveletter>: \\servername\share
     (do not use persistent switch)
** ensure on domain user logon, mapped drive is there and that local account mapped drive is not
** logoff and logon as necessary to ensure your issue is not recurring


I may have missed something someone else said, but the mapped drive on a local account needs to be fixed :-)

Hope that helps

kkohl -

totally agree that the local admin should not have the network drive mapped since he doesn't run the login script

the login script is using     wshNetwork.MapNetworkDrive "h:", "\\myserver\myshare"

Discovered something interesting today.  We recently upgraded the network from v9 to v10 of symantec antivirus corporate edition and prior to this upgrade this problem was unknown - or at least unnoticed.  I removed the symantec antivirus client from one of the pc's that had the problem, rebooted and things seem to work OK again (I was able to login a few domain users multiple times and did not get any disconnected drives).  I redeployed the SAV client and things still work ok (once again logged in domain users multiple times w/o getting a disconnected drive).  I repeated the process on a second machine that was having the problem and after removing / redeploying the SAV client the domain users are able to login w/o getting disconnected drives.  I'll have to watch these 2 systems for a few days and see if the problem reoccurs.

One other weird thing - one the 2 machines that were "fixed" as described the users have desktop shortcut icons for some of the mapped drives and after some logins one of the shortcuts to a network share gets a red question mark in the icon - but some logins result in the normal icon.  In all cases the network drive is not disconnecteed

Thank you!!

Hello I did remove the registery but it did not help so i used the command to delete * and removed all drives
but the x drive did not go away so
then i remapped another share as x drive which worked and then i removed it and it worked also

YES!

sorry also its not really a map drive its a glitch in the system.. thank you Microsoft