Programs can not “see” network drive until I manually browse to it

Question

We have a small peer-to-peer network with all Windows XP computers.

One computer is designated as a Server and has shared several folders. (And it's set to share again automatically on restart, which it does. Other computers on the network hvae a local drive (s:) mapped to that Server.

Other computers on the network have programs which execute from (i.e., the .exe is located on) those Server\ShraedFolders. However, after a fresh restart those apps don't run. If I manuall browse to the S: drive on the local computer then I can see the Server files. After that I can then start the program(s) that are located on the S:\drive.

These computers are all Windows XP SP2

Answer 1

Did you have an account on both (client/server) that have the SAME name and also the SAME password?

In a simple P2P network like yours, the easiest way to get things working is to have a commum account between the server and the client.

Answer 2

I was turning on the Server and Client PCs at the same time. When I booted up the Sever and waited 2 or 3 minutes before booting the client it works fine.

So... it seems that if the Client boots up and the Server isn't fully booted up then the Client diesn't "see" the shared drives until you manually browse to them.

SOLUTION: make sure the Server is fully booted up before starting the client.

Answer 3

if you have a local login with one password and a network login with the same name but a different password you will see this behavior.