I have a number of mapped drives (all of which are ticked for 'reconnect at log in' when I first mapped them) for folders on my MediaSmart server, but whenever I have to re-boot my desktop machine, although it signs in to the server automatically, I always get an information window pop up saying 'not all network drives could be reconnected' (or something close to that).

I then have to try to open a network drive, a username/password window opens, and I have to provide the info again. This is no big deal, but I'm wondering why the network drives don't reconnect automatically.

I'm running Vista, and the user id's and passwords are identical on the desktop machine and the server.

Thanks for any help.

I suspect that the drives are being mapped before the server connection is completed.

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....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

Thanks for the reply, John.

That might be so; the question is, what can I do about it? Any suggestions?

Do you really need to map drive letters? I have all my shares added as a network location and this never gives me any trouble. They are all listed under "My Computer" with no delay. I stopped mapping network drives to letters when I got the MSS and it makes life so much easier just using the UNC path. YMMV

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Sue

Thanks for the comment, Sue.

I've been using mapping out of habit, I suppose. Just this afternoon, in fact, I used the 'Shared folders' link, and it worked fine. Just after boot-up, when I first tried 'Shared folders', I still had to enter user ID/password to connect to my server, but from then on all my shared folders were easily accessed.

I suppose the other reason for pursuing automatic reconnection of mapped drives with my server was just to see how it could be done. I tried a batch file in my Start-up folder, using a series of 'use net' commands, one for each network drive ...but that didn't work, either, because, I suspect, the bat file ran before the home server was connected.

I guess I could run the bat file later in the boot-up, but I don't know how to do that, off hand. A little more learning is required.

Thanks again. I might just end up adopting your suggestion.

In a different thread Alex recommended this approach for a "sleep" (pause) in a BAT/CMD file:

_________________
....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

I have the same issue (JohnBick is refering to a thread I had started). The reason why I chose t o map the network drives is because I could not get Vista Media Center to recognize the drives if I didn't.

I was actually cleaning up my BAT file, and I think to add the sleep function you just need to add this to the start of the bat:



The othe problem I am trying to figure out how to connect to my MSS network drives at boot up when the PC that is booting up has no password (i.e my HTPC), so I am thinking about doing the following bat file:

>sleep 500

net use drive:\\Server /user:domain\username "password"

Will test it out later, any thoughts?

_________________
Cheers,
Damian

DIY WHS - 12.5TB and growing, too many gadgets to list

Did you read the MediaSmartServer blog today?
Blog - http://www.adigitalhomeblog.com
"Like a midget at a urinal, stay on your toes!" - Lieutenant Frank Drebin

I use the mapped method as well. Maybe I'm Old School (although I doubt it), but I've found that a lot of programs work better when saving documents, images, songs, etc to a share on a mapped drive (as it would if it were on the C: drive).

As for the mapping itself and the username/password BAT file, here's a variation of the one I created for my workstation.

@echo off
cls
net use M: \\HPSERVER\Music /user:username password
net use S: \\HPSERVER\Software /user:username password
net use U: \\HPSERVER\Users\My Documents /user:username password
net use w: \\HPSERVER\Web /user:username password
exit

Follow the syntax and substitute your actual sharenames, drive letters, username and password.
When you're done, save it as a BAT file and throw it in your "Startup" folder on your Start menu.

You'll still get the "failed to map" popup, but just ignore it. They're mapped alright.

Thanks, friendo.

I was toying with a batch file with these commands, but, I think, the server had not yet been added to the network before the bat file was executed ...and so I didn't get mapped drives.

So, during boot-up how do I schedule the batch file to run *after* the network connection is in place?

I think it's just a matter of adding the "sleep" command as in the batch file posted above mine (only not 500 seconds - unless you want to wait over 8 minutes for your drives to map - lol ).

Thanks again, friendo.

Great... I'll be trying it later today!

(I had thought that the 'sleep' command would simply cause all boot-up activity to pause, and, therefor, that the batch file would still run before my server was added to my network.)

Art

I use this method for all my PCs, although I don't think I get any popups. I just know I can go into all my mapped drives without any problems as long as run this script at startup.

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3TB MSS EX490(upgraded CPU-E6300(2.8Ghz dual core Pentium)),
4GB memory
57TB unRAID1a--49TB unRAID2--76TB unRAID3

I'm guessing the OP is using a wireless network. I have drives mapped to my MSS on my desktop PC that has an ethernet connection and have no problems with the mapped drives reconnecting. The ethernet connection goes live early enough in the boot up to enable it to connect with the MSS in time. In contrast, I have a laptop using a wireless connection and always have the could not connect to mapped network drives balloon come up when I reboot. It seems the wireless connection is late in the game upon start up and the mapped drives, as pointed out by others, tries to connect but the wireless connection is not established. I did notice that I really don't have to fix it because as soon as I use the program that needs those mapped network drives, it automatically re-establishes their connections with no prompting for anything. It sounds like the scripts mentioned about are the way to go to fix the timing issue. I may try it just to avoid having to see that balloon error message pop up on start-up.

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HP MSS EX490 with Intel E6300
4 GB RAM
7 TB Drive Storage

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