Access is denied to RSM on W2k3

Question

When I am logged in as an administrator (or a regular user) and I try to access "Removable Storage" in Computer Management in a Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition SP2 system I get a message reading:

Access is denied

the snapin's display may be inconsistent with the removable storage service. If the problem persists please restart the snap-in.

The problem persists, however I am not sure how to restart the snap in, other then closing the MMC and reopening it. That does not help. I have also tried uninstalling the driver and letting plug and play reinstall it, but that does not help either. I have not found a solution on technet or Google.

Any suggestions for fixing this?

How can access be denied to an administrator? How do I fix an inconsistent snapin display?

I also get an access denied message when I try to open disk management, so their may be a more general problem.

Answer 1

Does it work if you log in as the local administrator, rather than an account in the local admins group? If so it's obviously a user rights problem, though I'm not sure how you would have removed the rights from local admins.

JR

Re railmeat's comment: I wonder if this is a COM or DCOM problem. In Computer Management do you also get an error if you select "WMI Control" from under the "Services and Applications" heading? I would run up dcomcnfg and compare the various settings under "Component Services" with a working server. In particular expand Computers then right click My Computer and select Properties. Check the settings on the "Default Properties" and "COM Security" tabs.