Power Users Group Can Mount admin$ or c$ Remotely?

Question

I'm wondering if placing a user in the Power Users groups restricts that user's ability to remotely mount either admin$ or c$. My limited testing tells me that they can, but I'm curious to hear other thoughts from more experienced MS admins.

So far, Microsoft's docs on this are not useful, if you can point me to a doc with a definitive answer, that would be great too.

Answer 1

The administrative shares are only accessible to members of the local "Administrators" or "Backup Opeartors" (with "Server Operators" also having access on Windows Server OSs) on a groups on a given computer. If a user is a member of "Power Users" but not "Administrators" or "Backup Operators" (or "Server Operators") they will not be able to access the administrative shares.

Here's a doc from Microsoft re: these shares: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc722490.aspx

Answer 2

Here's an excellent article on why not to use the Power Users group: http://blogs.technet.com/markrussinovich/archive/2006/05/01/the-power-in-power-users.aspx; if Power Users can view the admin shares, that's proably symptomatic of a larger issue.

In Windows Vista and above, the Power Users group has the same rights as Users.