Windows 10 Network Shares, Password incorrect.

By EmuZombie
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Grand Master

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You may have noticed after upgrading to Windows 10, you can no longer access network shares.  You are 100% sure the login and password are correct but Windows is insisting your password is incorrect.  Or maybe you have disabled password protected sharing but it is still asking for a password.

 

This problem occurs when you have linked a Microsoft account to your login but have not setup (or you are not using) a homegroup.  

 

To see what is actually going on, let's look into the issue deeper.
 
In Windows 10, when a domain is not set and a Microsoft account is linked, it makes homegroup (tied to your Microsoft account) the default (and only) setting to use as authentication.   This causes incompatibility (both with Windows 10 and previous versions of Windows) if a homegroup is not used on the network.
 
In order to bypass this, we must "trick" Windows into thinking the network share is part of a domain.  By making Windows believe the share is part of a domain it will ignore homegroup authentication and use the legacy login system not tied to homegroups or Microsoft accounts.  

 

To do this, simply add <anything>\ to the login user name.    The <anything> can be whatever you please, it can be the PC Name, it can be WORKGROUP, it can be a period, it can even be Neowin if you want.  

 

Example:  Your User name is Bob, and your password is 12345.  You would log in as: 

User:  .\Bob
Password: 12345


 Now, let's say you prefer the old insecure way of Windows shares and you have turned password protected sharing off.  (I am assuming you already know what you are doing and I will not cover how to do this or the dangers of doing so in this guide)

 

You would then login as the following:   

User:  .\Guest
Password:  <blank>


It remains to be seen whether this is a bug or by design.  If it is indeed a bug, it may one day be fixed and render this guide useless. (fair warning for everyone in the future)

 

 

Special thanks to warwagon and his original thread addressing this issue.

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Grand Master

HawkMan

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Posted

OR you could just go into network setting and set it to use username and passwords to authenticate instead of a homegroup. The min issue then is merely to know what the actual windows username for your microsoft account is. 

Grand Master

EmuZombie Veteran

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5 hours ago, HawkMan said:

OR you could just go into network setting and set it to use username and passwords to authenticate instead of a homegroup. 

Except that doesn't actually do anything...

 

1.thumb.png.a25bd8b51892179ea23e6720b307

 

 

After adding .\  

Leads to:

3.thumb.png.02c4633306f4d843992e9f268c2e

 

 

 

 

Grand Master

binaryzero

Posted
Posted (edited)

I love how you started a new thread, the other was fine.

 

And just for the sake of this thread before buttman throws his 2 cents in - this method of logging onto a machine has been around for, I dunno, 10+ years? I've been doing it FOREVER. 

Grand Master

HawkMan

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, Jared- said:

I love how you started a new thread, the other was fine.

 

And just for the sake of this thread before buttman throws his 2 cents in - this method of logging onto a machine has been around for, I dunno, 10+ years? I've been doing it FOREVER. 

I'm not even entirely sure this is the same issue as the other thread. especially since this focuses entirely on win10

  • 3 weeks later...
Neowinian

abnet

Posted
Posted

I too have been banging my head against the wall with this problem since upgrading both PCs on my home network from Windows 8.1 Pro to Windows 10 Pro yesterday. I should also highlight (as I believe it's rlevant to this issue) that at same time I changed the Windows login for BOTH PCs from local login to a Microsoft account. Prior to these changes I could access the network shares on my wife's PC by just entering username and password but today it just would not accept my password which I knew was correct.

A Google search toook me to this thread and after changing my username to format <computername>/Username it at last allowed me to connect to my wife's PC's shared folders. I registered on this forum solely to post my thanks for this.

Grand Master

EmuZombie Veteran

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1 hour ago, Circaflex said:

How is this thread any different than what warwagon created? 

 

The original thread by warwagon contained conflicting information and ended up turning into a debate rather than a guide.  It was confusing for anyone who came across it from searching.

 

The original thread by warwagon is credited and linked to as well in this guide.

  • 1 year later...
Neowinian

T0rqu3

Posted
Posted

I am getting this error in a domain network and using a script to mapped a drive using net use command. When log in to Win 10 for the first time and run the script I am getting password error. Without entering any cred and close the command and rerun the script the error is gone and mapping the drive is successful. Would you know why I have to rerun before it work?

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Daedroth

Posted
Posted (edited)
6 minutes ago, T0rqu3 said:

I am getting this error in a domain network and using a script to mapped a drive using net use command. When log in to Win 10 for the first time and run the script I am getting password error. Without entering any cred and close the command and rerun the script the error is gone and mapping the drive is successful. Would you know why I have to rerun before it work?

Try using Group Policy Preferences and item-level targetting (if required) instead of a script. It works without problems for us, has done for 2.5 years, across Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 machines.

 

Here is my configuration:

 

Group Policy > User Configuration > Preferences > Windows Settings > Drive Maps

 

Right click the blank white space > New > Mapped Drive

 

Set the following:

General Tab

Action = Replace

Location = Full FQDN of share

Drive Letter = Existing > Set letter from drop down list

Connect as (optional) = Leave blank unless the you have to use different credentials than the users' own (not recommended)

Hide/Show this drive = Choose your desired (it will determine whether it is visible in File Explorer

Hide/Show all drives = No Change

 

Common Tab

Stop processing items in this extension if an error occurs = unchecked

Run in logged-on user's security context (user policy option) = unchecked

Remove this item when it is no longer applied = checked

Item-level targetting = checked > Press the 'Targetting...' button to set your requirements.

 

Edited by Daedroth
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