Hi, We use group policy preferences to map non-persistent drives on XP and Vista. We have started to test Windows 7 and keep getting network drives appearing as disconnected when logging in off the network. This behaviour doesn't occur with our XP or Vista machines. Net use shows no disconnected network drives when offline. Any tips for any setting changes would be appreciated. Regards, Daryl Lyford

Please describe the detail symptom to us. When you log in with the network connection disconnected, certainly the mapped drive should be disconnected. What is wrong with it? If you would like to use these mapped drives when the system is offline, you can enable the “Always available offline”.Arthur Xie - MSFT

Please describe the detail symptom to us. When you log in with the network connection disconnected, certainly the mapped drive should be disconnected. What is wrong with it? If you would like to use these mapped drives when the system is offline, you can enable the “Always available offline”.Arthur Xie - MSFT

Hi Arthur, If we log onto the Win 7 computer while connected to the network we get the drive mappings as intended with no persistance set. If we then shutdown/restart/log off and pull the network connection and log back in, we see the drive mappings still appear, but in a disconnected state. On Vista or XP, the mapped drives correctly do not show. There's no offline files configured on the mappings. There's folder redirection in use on the user's home drive only. Example: Logging in conencted to the network (Win7, Vista, XP): C: - local drive G: - network drive - connected no persistance H: - network drive - connected no persistance (folder redirection in place) J: - network drive - connected no persistance Logging in disconnected from the network (Win7): C: - local drive G: - network drive - shows as disconnected H: - network drive - shows as connected (due to folder redirection, this is OK to stay like this) j: - network drive - shows as disconnected Logging in disconnected from the network (Vista, XP) - Intended outcome: C: - local drive

Hi Arthur, If we log onto the Win 7 computer while connected to the network we get the drive mappings as intended with no persistance set. If we then shutdown/restart/log off and pull the network connection and log back in, we see the drive mappings still appear, but in a disconnected state. On Vista or XP, the mapped drives correctly do not show. There's no offline files configured on the mappings. There's folder redirection in use on the user's home drive only. Example: Logging in conencted to the network (Win7, Vista, XP): C: - local drive G: - network drive - connected no persistance H: - network drive - connected no persistance (folder redirection in place) J: - network drive - connected no persistance Logging in disconnected from the network (Win7): C: - local drive G: - network drive - shows as disconnected H: - network drive - shows as connected (due to folder redirection, this is OK to stay like this) j: - network drive - shows as disconnected Logging in disconnected from the network (Vista, XP) - Intended outcome: C: - local drive

How does it work in Safe Mode with Network?Arthur Xie - MSFT

How does it work in Safe Mode with Network?Arthur Xie - MSFT

I just tried safe mode with network while disconnected from the network and it gives the same result as normal mode.

I just tried safe mode with network while disconnected from the network and it gives the same result as normal mode.

I will report this behavior to proper department. Thank you for your feedback. Arthur Xie - MSFT

I will report this behavior to proper department. Thank you for your feedback. Arthur Xie - MSFT

Has there been any update to this?

Has there been any update to this?

I also have the same issue. File server running 2008R2, laptop running Windows7 64 bit, drives mapped via GPO preferences. When I shutdown and go off the network the drives still show up with a red X. This only happens in Windows7. I think Grolls has also explained the issue well. Anyone have any ideas?

I also have the same issue. File server running 2008R2, laptop running Windows7 64 bit, drives mapped via GPO preferences. When I shutdown and go off the network the drives still show up with a red X. This only happens in Windows7. I think Grolls has also explained the issue well. Anyone have any ideas?

Do you have any new tips for this problems about GPO preferences and non-persistent drivers on Windows 7? Regards, Matjaz Premerl

Do you have any new tips for this problems about GPO preferences and non-persistent drivers on Windows 7? Regards, Matjaz Premerl

I still haven't found a resolution, so we are just living with the issue. We don't have too many laptops, so it's only impacting a few of our users currently.

I still haven't found a resolution, so we are just living with the issue. We don't have too many laptops, so it's only impacting a few of our users currently.

Hi, It looks like I've got the same issue as yourself http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverGP/thread/b41e9e70-9dc2-4f67-9139-1cd36c1470e5/ If I find a resolution I'll post back. J

Hi, It looks like I've got the same issue as yourself http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverGP/thread/b41e9e70-9dc2-4f67-9139-1cd36c1470e5/ If I find a resolution I'll post back. J

I've also had this issue, and another. I have an all Gbps (latency less than 1ms) LAN with mostly 2008R2 servers. All DCs and File Servers are 2008R2 x64. Most of our laptops are Windows 7 64bit. All users have their local My Documents/Documents folder mapped to \\fileserver\users\%username%\My Documents. I then have GPOs that disable offline files for all desktops and enable it for all laptops. It also forces the user's My Documents files to be "Always available offline". For most people this works, but for a few users, they will have been logged in for hours and will notice that files that are copied to the file server are not showing up when they attempt to view them in common shared folders that are not available offline. Everything else is fine. They are able to connect to the web, use Exchange, print, etc. The Windows Sync center which I have found to be particularly useless indicates no issues. Here are the GPOs I have in place for Offline Files users: Network/Offline Files PolicySettingComment Action on server disconnectEnabled Specify how the system is to respond when a network server becomes unavailable. Action: Work offline Never go offline = Server's files are unavailable to local computer Work offline = Server's files are available to local computer PolicySettingComment Configure Slow link speedEnabled Value entered is [ bps / 100 ] --> Example: 128,000bps, enter 1280 Value: 640 PolicySettingComment Configure slow-link modeDisabled Default cache sizeEnabled Value entered is [ percent disk used * 10,000 ]. For example, to indicate 12.53%, enter 1253. Default cache size: 1500 PolicySettingComment Enable Transparent CachingEnabled Enter the network latency value above which network files will be temporarily cached on the client. Enter network latency value in milliseconds300 PolicySettingComment Event logging levelEnabled Enter [0-3]: 1 0 = Cache data corrupted 1 = Log 'server offline' 2 = Level 1 + log 'net stopped' and 'net started' 3 = Level 2 + log 'server available for reconnection' PolicySettingComment Files not cachedEnabled Files may be excluded from caching on auto-cache shared folders based on their extension. Enter a list of extensions to be excluded. Extensions must be preceded by an asterisk and period. "e.g. *.dbf;*.ndx;*.lnk Extensions: *.pst;*.mdb;*.tmp PolicySettingComment Reminder balloon frequencyEnabled Number of minutes between reminder balloons Minutes: 60 PolicySettingComment Synchronize all offline files before logging offEnabled Synchronize all offline files when logging onEnabled Synchronize offline files before suspendEnabled Type of synchronization to perform when suspending: Action:Quick This is an incredibly frustrating issue and I'd love to be able to figure out how to resolve this. It is especially maddening that the system doesn't indicate there is an issue until someone actually notices that files are not visible. What is strange is that the "update lag" that I'm seeing appears in shared folders that are not in the local users CSC (Client Side Cache). For instance, user A (using a desktop PC (Win7 x64)) copies a file to the share \\fileserver\department\reports, this share is also mapped to drive W:\, we use login scripts to ensure all users have the same shares/drive letters mapped. Two minutes later, user B goes to open the shared folder to review the uploaded document and it isn't visible. F5 does not resolve the issue. Folder is showsn as Online. After running a few manual syncs with the Sync center, the file appears. What in the world is going on?

I've also had this issue, and another. I have an all Gbps (latency less than 1ms) LAN with mostly 2008R2 servers. All DCs and File Servers are 2008R2 x64. Most of our laptops are Windows 7 64bit. All users have their local My Documents/Documents folder mapped to \\fileserver\users\%username%\My Documents. I then have GPOs that disable offline files for all desktops and enable it for all laptops. It also forces the user's My Documents files to be "Always available offline". For most people this works, but for a few users, they will have been logged in for hours and will notice that files that are copied to the file server are not showing up when they attempt to view them in common shared folders that are not available offline. Everything else is fine. They are able to connect to the web, use Exchange, print, etc. The Windows Sync center which I have found to be particularly useless indicates no issues. Here are the GPOs I have in place for Offline Files users: Network/Offline Files PolicySettingComment Action on server disconnectEnabled Specify how the system is to respond when a network server becomes unavailable. Action: Work offline Never go offline = Server's files are unavailable to local computer Work offline = Server's files are available to local computer PolicySettingComment Configure Slow link speedEnabled Value entered is [ bps / 100 ] --> Example: 128,000bps, enter 1280 Value: 640 PolicySettingComment Configure slow-link modeDisabled Default cache sizeEnabled Value entered is [ percent disk used * 10,000 ]. For example, to indicate 12.53%, enter 1253. Default cache size: 1500 PolicySettingComment Enable Transparent CachingEnabled Enter the network latency value above which network files will be temporarily cached on the client. Enter network latency value in milliseconds300 PolicySettingComment Event logging levelEnabled Enter [0-3]: 1 0 = Cache data corrupted 1 = Log 'server offline' 2 = Level 1 + log 'net stopped' and 'net started' 3 = Level 2 + log 'server available for reconnection' PolicySettingComment Files not cachedEnabled Files may be excluded from caching on auto-cache shared folders based on their extension. Enter a list of extensions to be excluded. Extensions must be preceded by an asterisk and period. "e.g. *.dbf;*.ndx;*.lnk Extensions: *.pst;*.mdb;*.tmp PolicySettingComment Reminder balloon frequencyEnabled Number of minutes between reminder balloons Minutes: 60 PolicySettingComment Synchronize all offline files before logging offEnabled Synchronize all offline files when logging onEnabled Synchronize offline files before suspendEnabled Type of synchronization to perform when suspending: Action:Quick This is an incredibly frustrating issue and I'd love to be able to figure out how to resolve this. It is especially maddening that the system doesn't indicate there is an issue until someone actually notices that files are not visible. What is strange is that the "update lag" that I'm seeing appears in shared folders that are not in the local users CSC (Client Side Cache). For instance, user A (using a desktop PC (Win7 x64)) copies a file to the share \\fileserver\department\reports, this share is also mapped to drive W:\, we use login scripts to ensure all users have the same shares/drive letters mapped. Two minutes later, user B goes to open the shared folder to review the uploaded document and it isn't visible. F5 does not resolve the issue. Folder is showsn as Online. After running a few manual syncs with the Sync center, the file appears. What in the world is going on?

We´ve have faced the same issue in our environment. We also have Windows 7 clients and a W28KR2 fileserver and connect our network drives with GPP as non-persistent. When we shutdown the labtop and start it without network connection the drives are marked with a red X in windows explorer. Also the drives shows up in the registry HKCU\Network which normally only occurs if you make a persistent drive mapping. So my question: Are there any updates to this potential Windows 7 bug?

We´ve have faced the same issue in our environment. We also have Windows 7 clients and a W28KR2 fileserver and connect our network drives with GPP as non-persistent. When we shutdown the labtop and start it without network connection the drives are marked with a red X in windows explorer. Also the drives shows up in the registry HKCU\Network which normally only occurs if you make a persistent drive mapping. So my question: Are there any updates to this potential Windows 7 bug?

I have started trying to test GPP Mapped drives in our environment. We are running into the exact same problem and no amount of searching has turned up a resolution to this issue. Has anyone made any progress on this issue?

I have started trying to test GPP Mapped drives in our environment. We are running into the exact same problem and no amount of searching has turned up a resolution to this issue. Has anyone made any progress on this issue?

I have the exact same issue just now. I'm testing windows 7 drive mapping policies. I have 2 VMs, one is a 'laptop' and one is a 'desktop'. I'm testing the following settings Laptops - My documents redirected to home drive. Sync center is on and only for this drive. Desktops - My docs redirected Offline files completely disabled. Both machines I test with disabling the network card and rebooting. Both machines behave as expected, no mapped home drive on the desktop, mapped homedrive on the laptop working in offline mode. Now introduce a drive mapping I map a drive letter to a share for a certain test user with the following settings. Action Replace Properties Letter S Location \\server\Sync Test Reconnect Disabled Label as sync test Use first available Disabled Hide/Show this drive No change Hide/Show all drives No change Common Options Stop processing items on this extension if an error occurs on this item No Run in logged-on user's security context (user policy option) No Remove this item when it is no longer applied Yes Item-level targeting: User bool AND not 0 name sid This drive will map on both machines and on both machines when network card is disabled and the machine rebooted, both machines take a really log time to log in and I'm prompted with 'disconnected network drives' warning. I should note that the User targetting above, I've removed the credentials from the copy/paste. It's targetting 1 test account user. Would love to know what is going on here, we can't roll it out in this state because all laptops will take forever to log on when off the network.

Hi All I have this problem with Group policy preferences on Windows XP machines when they are connected to the network they get the drive mappings just fine however if they are not connected IE VPN users the drives are not showing up in contrast the windows 7 machines that we have map these fine and when disconnected to the network the drives show as disconnected allowing the user to connect to the VPN then click the drive and all access is fine is there a way to make this work for XP

John, it sounds like you have the exact same behaviour as everyone else with windows 7, except it's working in your benefit (for windows 7). You mention windows XP, how is your drive mapping working in this case? You also mention VPN, so this probably connects after login locally to the machine, In that case a login script wouldn't run? Where-as because windows 7 isn't forgetting the drive mapping, then once the network connection comes up, the persistent mapping is just reconnected.

Hi dogfsh yes you are 100% right i am getting the same issue as everyone else and it is a good thing for me the problem is with the windows XP machines, they run cisco VPN client so they do connect the VPN after logon however when we used logon scripts we set the drives as persistent and they were always available so for this to replace log on scipts I would have expected the same the odd thing is if i run a script to map the drives then log off and log back on the 2 drive letters that are mapped in the GPO are removed and the ther drives mapped by the script are there so the GPo is applying at some level but not mapping the drives i would have thought that this would be a simple problem to get around due to VPN thanks

I have the exact same issue just now. I'm testing windows 7 drive mapping policies. I have 2 VMs, one is a 'laptop' and one is a 'desktop'. I'm testing the following settings Laptops - My documents redirected to home drive. Sync center is on and only for this drive. Desktops - My docs redirected Offline files completely disabled. Both machines I test with disabling the network card and rebooting. Both machines behave as expected, no mapped home drive on the desktop, mapped homedrive on the laptop working in offline mode. Now introduce a drive mapping I map a drive letter to a share for a certain test user with the following settings. Action Replace Properties Letter S Location \\server\Sync Test Reconnect Disabled Label as sync test Use first available Disabled Hide/Show this drive No change Hide/Show all drives No change Common Options Stop processing items on this extension if an error occurs on this item No Run in logged-on user's security context (user policy option) No Remove this item when it is no longer applied Yes Item-level targeting: User bool AND not 0 name sid This drive will map on both machines and on both machines when network card is disabled and the machine rebooted, both machines take a really log time to log in and I'm prompted with 'disconnected network drives' warning. I should note that the User targetting above, I've removed the credentials from the copy/paste. It's targetting 1 test account user. Would love to know what is going on here, we can't roll it out in this state because all laptops will take forever to log on when off the network.

Hi All I have this problem with Group policy preferences on Windows XP machines when they are connected to the network they get the drive mappings just fine however if they are not connected IE VPN users the drives are not showing up in contrast the windows 7 machines that we have map these fine and when disconnected to the network the drives show as disconnected allowing the user to connect to the VPN then click the drive and all access is fine is there a way to make this work for XP

John, it sounds like you have the exact same behaviour as everyone else with windows 7, except it's working in your benefit (for windows 7). You mention windows XP, how is your drive mapping working in this case? You also mention VPN, so this probably connects after login locally to the machine, In that case a login script wouldn't run? Where-as because windows 7 isn't forgetting the drive mapping, then once the network connection comes up, the persistent mapping is just reconnected.

Hi dogfsh yes you are 100% right i am getting the same issue as everyone else and it is a good thing for me the problem is with the windows XP machines, they run cisco VPN client so they do connect the VPN after logon however when we used logon scripts we set the drives as persistent and they were always available so for this to replace log on scipts I would have expected the same the odd thing is if i run a script to map the drives then log off and log back on the 2 drive letters that are mapped in the GPO are removed and the ther drives mapped by the script are there so the GPo is applying at some level but not mapping the drives i would have thought that this would be a simple problem to get around due to VPN thanks

Hi, I've just tried this ho fix http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2551503 which resolved my issue with non persistent drives being persistent. J

I found the answer today - and have been looking for months. Go to Control Panel - under System settings - GoTo Power Settings Then GoTo "Change when the computer sleeps" Here is where you find "Change Advanced Power Settings" Click it You may need to click on "change settings that are currently unavailable" to make changes below 1) uncheck Hard disk - and change settings for the hard disk "while plugged in" to 180 minutes. The hard drive will go to sleep after 3 hours of non-use. Make longer if needed. 2) uncheck Wireless adaptor - and change "Plugged in" to maximum performance 3) uncheck Sleep - and make sure all "Pllugged in" options read Never 4) uncheck PCI Express and make sure everything is on Maximum I don't know if all 4 changes above are needed - but one of these changes seem to be working on five of our new computers that were putting the Red X on the connected Network drives. I hope someone at Microsoft puts this information out to the public - I can be reached at 973-292-0025 Scott

I found the answer today - and have been looking for months. Go to Control Panel - under System settings - GoTo Power Settings Then GoTo "Change when the computer sleeps" Here is where you find "Change Advanced Power Settings" Click it You may need to click on "change settings that are currently unavailable" to make changes below 1) uncheck Hard disk - and change settings for the hard disk "while plugged in" to 180 minutes. The hard drive will go to sleep after 3 hours of non-use. Make longer if needed. 2) uncheck Wireless adaptor - and change "Plugged in" to maximum performance 3) uncheck Sleep - and make sure all "Plugged in" options read Never 4) uncheck PCI Express and make sure everything is on Maximum I don't know if all 4 changes above are needed - but one of these changes seem to be working on five of our new computers that were putting the Red X on the connected Network drives. I hope someone at Microsoft puts this information out to the public ALSO you need to go into Device Manager open your Network Card(s) (properties) GoTo Power Management and uncheck the boxes suggesting the device can go to sleep. I can be reached at 973-292-0025 Scott