Question W10 Networking Issue - Cannot connect to file share

[Illwamh]

Hi all, thanks in advance with your help with this.

Bit of backstory in case it proves relevant, I work remotely for a small company (I am the IT guy ironically). The company does not have servers or anything so uses file shares on two of the machines for server like purposes. Ie hosting the back end of a database. There are aprox 15 machines in total all on one network via a workgroup.

I have a dedicated machine running 24/7 (just for me) which I can remote desktop into and gain access to the network and therefore file shares should I need anything local to the site to do my work. We recently switched out this PC for a different one, but the new one seems to have a networking issue I cannot diagnose. The new PC (is an old PC) had W10 installed clean and is basically still in that state.

I cannot access the two relevant PC's over network to get at the file shares. Windows just reports that it could not be accessed, check the spelling.

Where this gets weird,
I can ping both PC's from my remote desktop PC - either by ip or pc name, both work fine. I can't access the PC via windows explorer by ping or pc name.
I can access any other PC from my remote desktop PC (the other 12 PC's on the network), just not these two PC's. It isn't like netowrking/file sharing is not working at all
Every other PC on the network can access these two PC's as well as all other PC's

All PC's are W10 fully up to date. All of them can talk to all of them, with the exception of the PC I remote into, which can talk to all but the relevant 2.

The only thing in common I can think of with the 2 PC's I can't access is they are the only PC's with password sharing turned off. Ie you need no password to access file shares for those two PC's but for all other PC's you do need a password. But I have no clue how that would cause an issue. Windows does not get as far as authenticating, it simply can't find the PC (despite seeing it on the network)

I'm at a bit of a loss as to how to remedy the situation. Any help would be much appreciated. Obviously physically moving the PC and checking connection is going to prove difficult, but I'm fairly certain it is a windows networking issue.

Thanks!

 

[anotherdrew]

So, windows file sharing works over a protocol called SMB (Server Message Blocks). It runs on top of TCP/IP. That means that being able to ping the computer in question is only step one ... it does not mean that the two computer will talk via SMB. SMB was designed to be an easy way for 2 computers to talk, but unfortunately when you make things easy for the end user, you also make it easy for hackers. Microsoft has tried to make it more secure, but that means it's harder to use.

Why would SMB not work?

1. Firewall issues. This could be the windows firewall (which is enabled by default) or another firewall (router ??).
2. SMB version issue. SMB comes in 3 flavors, SMB 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 and they don't always talk to each other. SMB 1.0 is normally disabled on Windows 10 (too easy to hack) and SMB 3.0 is not always enabled.

This might also have something to do with how you remote in (remote desktop, PC anywhere, or ??), but then if I understood you correctly, the computer you connect to to remote in can not access the share, so fixing that might need to be step one ... that or you should consider remoting in another way (VPN??).

 

[Illwamh]

Thanks for taking the time to get back to me.

I included the fact I was remoting in just so step one recommended to me wasn't unplug everything and try again, as I can't really do so (although I have had people at the office reseat the ethernet cables and reboot the switches - I can and have rebooted the router). For further info, as it may be relevant, when I said I remote into a dedicated PC I just meant there is one PC that no one uses and is set up just for me to remote into. I can remote into any of the PC's on the network. All are set up to enable remote desktop (windows homebrand remote desktop) and I have access to all of them. I can remote into any of the other PC's just fine and access the shares just like I can access the shares if sat at those machines. The machine dedicated for me I cannot access any of the shares.

The two shares I need access to are on PC's that windows network can see, they are listed, but when clicking on the PC's to access them it gives me the error about not finding it and spelling.

I have tried disabling the firewall on my remote machine and this has no impact. I'm going to assume disabling it on the target machines won't have any impact either, but I will try shortly, simply because both are accesible to every other PC and I don't know how a setting blocking my remote PC would have occured simultaneously in both target PC's. I will check with the firewall disabled on the target machines tomorrow.

I've checked today and all machines have SMB1 disabled and SMB2 enabled. I find no mention of SMB3 so guessing not enabled.

 

[anotherdrew]

Sorry for the late reply ...

Since I'm not an SMB expert, I had to do a bunch of reading. The error you are seeing tends to come down to firewall blocking of port 445 (could be incoming or outgoing), a security issue (permissions), or network setting glitch that is fixed by resetting the network. Since the two problematic PCs both have the password sharing turned off, I wonder if that has created a permissions issue with sharing.