Undisconnectable Disconnected Network Drives

First off, I'm a desktop/support person for my company and I'm hoping someone could help me out with a problem regarding automatically assigned network drives, and how to remove them.

I have a user with WinXPPro and has a couple of drives mapped to some of our networks (B, P, S, X) and ones that are assigned to the hard drive and optical drive (C and D). The problem is that all the other letters have been automatically assigned as well, each one with a display name "Disconnected Network Drive" If you open any of these auto assigned drives, it connects to one of our network folders despite its disconnected label. The problem is that I cannot disconnect the network drive. I've tried it in Windows (both right clicking and Tools > Disconnect Network Drive...) as well as through the dos prompt (the "net use" command doesn't display the drives automatically assigned).

On my end, I've tried using a login script (Active Directory UC Home folder) that forced a letter to be mapped to a certain location. So when she logs in, that letter we've assigned is pointing in the correct direction. Initially, this worked as only the letters that we've assigned appear. But after a few minutes, each unassigned letter would automatically appear one by one, ending when all available letters are used up.

 

clm - welcome to the forum and thank you for posting an interesting glitch. This one is a first for me.

First thing I would try is to turn off File & Printer Sharing then from a start->run line, sfc /scannow. When that finishes, open a cmd window and key in chkdsk /f and ENTER. When you get the message about the vol. being in use, answer Yes to doing the chkdsk at next boot then reboot.

Turn File & Printer Sharing back on and see what happens. Let us know.

 

It worked! - almost

Thanks, i really appreciate it! You don't know how long i've been looking for a solution.

But a few questions if that's okay:
1) im not exactly sure what the 'sfc' command does. i've looked it up and I've read that it replaces Windows files with the correct versions. Would this be any different from running a repair off a Windows install disk?
2) and wouldn't the scndks /f be the same thing as well???

*******
edit:

actually, it worked initially. I let it sit there watching the My Computer window to see if anything would happen. Since it looked okay, i decided to reboot. This time it came up okay... until the mysterious drives popped up one after another again.

newt, do you have any other suggestions??

 

Moving this topic from XP to Networking

1) I'm not exactly sure what the 'sfc' command does. I've looked it up and I've read that it replaces Windows files with the correct versions. Would this be any different from running a repair off a Windows install disk?

SFC (system file checker) scans the system for missing or damaged system files and replaces any it finds with a good copy from CD or from your latest service pack .cab file, depending on which version is needed.

Repair using the CD is more drastic and more likely to cause you some data loss. It also (and I'm not sure why) does not seem to fix some problems that SFC takes care of.

2) and wouldn't the scndks /f be the same thing as well???

Chkdsk /f (and it's more thorough cousin chkdsk /r) look for damaged files and attempt to repair the damage rather than replace the file. Good at times in that they check all the files while SFC only looks at windows system files. On occasion the chkdsk repairs will get a little to vigorous though and destroy some files you might need.

I like to try the least dangerous option first and for a situation like yours, that is SFC.


*******
edit:

actually, it worked initially. I let it sit there watching the My Computer window to see if anything would happen. Since it looked okay, i decided to reboot. This time it came up okay... until the mysterious drives popped up one after another again.

newt, do you have any other suggestions??

Surely do. As I said in the beginning, those were the First things to try. Often cure the problem and at worst give us a known clean starting point.

This is an interesting problem and to be honest, is one I've never even heard about before. Net Use should certainly show network drive information be the drive connected or disconnected. Here is what mine at work looks like

Code:

Status       Local     Remote                    Network

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK           J:        \\dartfs1\groups           Microsoft Windows Network
OK           X:        \\dartfs1\groups\is\group-files 
                                                 Microsoft Windows Network
OK           Y:        \\dartfs1\groups\is\group-files\grouptestshare 
                                                 Microsoft Windows Network
Disconnected Z:        \\dartora1\midapps         Microsoft Windows Network
OK                     \\dartfs1\users-a          Microsoft Windows Network
The command completed successfully.

Are you only having problems on a single machine or is it more widespread?

 

Thanks for the information Newt! It came in handy with another problem i had at home.

As for this users 'net use,' here it is:

E:\>net use
New connections will be remembered.


Status Local Remote Network

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK B: \\trosprj01\share Microsoft Windows Network
OK E: \\trocor01\share Microsoft Windows Network
OK P: \\trocor01\personal\rterzian
Microsoft Windows Network
OK S: \\trocor01\share Microsoft Windows Network
Disconnected X: \\10.1.215.10\cd801 Microsoft Windows Network
OK \\10.1.220.70\share Microsoft Windows Network
The command completed successfully.

everything here appears as it should, but in the My Computer window, all the other available drive letters are used up.

There are a couple other users who are having the same problem. I tried the original solution on one user and it worked out fine! What the difference is between these two users, i'm not sure. Everyone is on the same domain, server etc .... I'm going to try it out on a couple more computers.

 

clm - while this article doesn't seem to be on all fours with your problem, you might want to consider the registry tweaks and patches shown in http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=816375

 

Tony hit it. That is a quirk in XP that drives me crazy. By default out of the box it will seek out every printer and drive on the network that is shared out and attach itself to it. In a big group the printer folder will be full of auto connected printers.

As Tony said in Windows Explorer, Tools, Folder Options, View Tab. clear the top check box.

 

Disconnected Network Drives Error

Hey TonyT Im new to this site. I was experiencing this same issue with disconnected network drives . My network manager and I could not figure out what was causing this until reading your post. I also noticed that this occurs if workstations are left logged into the network for a long period of time such as 5 days or more. Some of my users are lazy and just "lock" their workstaions instead of logging off. I noticed this in the computer management MMC of our domain controller. I was seeing connections times over 5 days.

I put together a small script that runs Pcshutdown for all of our workstations and the problem has gone away.

 

I'm having the same problem. My network is small (8 workstations and a windows 2003 server). I have 5 windows xp machines doing this.

I also have this problem, I have a drive mapped to a uses home directory. Sometimes it is mapped to the \\server\users\%username% like it is supposed to, but other times it maps to \\server\users\ Any ideas on what would cause that?

 

J-fu - welcome to you.

This topic is getting confusing with so many different folks posting problems to it. Best idea (and we know this from experience) to get a solution is to start a new thread for yourself giving all details.

I'm locking this one and asking you to start a new one for yourself. Please specify if your network is a domain or a workgroup along with a detailed problem description.