On my Windows 7 laptop I have the drive partitioned into Drives C,D,E,F,G. When I look at "properties" drives D,E, and F under the Security tab it just has one entry called "Everyone" in the Group or user names box. These three drives share just fine and can be accessed from all the other Windows 7 and XP computers on the network. However the other two drives (C and G) can't be accessed from the other computers. (I just get the dreaded "//ComputerName/G is not accessible. You might not have permission ..." message). I've shared all the drives by the same method so I don't see why there should be a difference with drives C and G. One difference I notice however is that under the security tab for those two drives I don't see the "Everyone" group listed. Instead I see 4 item list (Authenticated Users, SYSTEM, Admins, Users). I have a feeling if I could get this to show the Everyone group then it would work. Interestingly enough, if I click on the Sharing tab, then "Advanced Sharing" and then click on "Permissions" I do see the "Everyone" group there and I have allowed Full Control, Change, and Read privilages for "Everyone". Yet the Everyone group still does not appear in the security tab for these two drives. Does anybody know what is going on here? Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

"I don't see why there should be a difference with drives C and G." In Windows 7 by default the %systemroot% (C:\ in your case) drive is not shared to everyone, (save for admin shares $) nor is the Everyone group allowed access by default as per best practices for security reasons. There is no sense in allowing the Everyone group access to the root drive either as it would allow Guest accounts access to read & write access in this location (a big no no). If you simply must share the entire system drive, best practices suggest that you use the Authenticate Users group to control access & not the Everyone group. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd277461.aspx Rather than sharing the entire systemroot drive it's more practical to create a share on that drive & add the groups which you'd like to have access to that share. Drive G: in your case is ambigious, can you look in Disk Management to see what the partition is used for & reply back? http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc782737(WS.10).aspx

I looked in Disk Management and drive G is marked as Simple, Basic, NTFS, Healthy(Logical Drive) which is exactly the same as the D,E, and F drives so I don't see why it would be treated differently. I realize the C drive is more dangerous to share, although I only have trusted family members on the network so it really isn't a problem ... which is also why I don't use passwords. Sharing the G drive is more the problem, although I would still like to share the C drive too if possible since it occasionally comes in handy. By the way, I'm not a sticker for how it is done as long as I can get it to work. I don't care if I use "Everyone" or some other group as long as it works. (I just mentioned that since it was the only difference I saw and thought that it might be related to the problem). By the way, I have used gpedit.msc to disable the "Limit local account use of blank passwords to console login only" on all the computer. I don't know if this is helping or not but it is one of the many things I've read to try. I've also gone into the Network and Sharing Center, under change advanced settings, and selected "Turn off password protected sharing". It seemed that this was necessary since without it my other computers couldn't see the computer. By the way this "//ComputerName/Drive not accessible" message has got to be one of the more frustrating messages since it gives me no hints of what the reason might be. It seems that there are many possible reasons, although it looks like I've tried them all. Seems like in Windows 3.1 and ME I could always get networking to work. In every version after that it got a little bit harder to the point that in Vista and 7 it is so hard I might have to just go back to the "sneaker net". Trouble is, most of my computers no longer even have floppy drives, so the sneaker net is not quite as practical anymore.

are you unable to add a C:\ security entry for Everyone? i think that would give the result you want. possibly Anonymous would be better for your purposes. i've been meaning to experiment with it, but haven't gotten around to it yet. (actually, i did, but it was an undisciplined scattergun fix for my permissions problem, so i'm not really sure). since cschaar appears to have experience with this, maybe he will offer his insight. noticing you have 5 partitions, it is not surprising to see that G: is a logical drive. i never do that, so i can't offer anything further about why it might have different default security settings. but it's a clue.

> are you unable to add a C:\ security entry for Everyone? i think that would give the result you want. Actually you are correct. It was as simple as adding an "Everyone" group in the security tab. I've seen several other posts suggesting this would fix the problem, but I wasn't prepared for how difficult they make it for you to actually do this. I thought I would be able to search for the object type (user, group, or whatever it is) or simply select "Everyone" from a list. But no, one actually has to click "Edit", and then click "Add" and then TYPE THE WORD "Everyone" into the box. Once Everyone is in the list of Group or user names, you can highlight it and select the desired permissions from the list below. I've been trying for days to get this networking thing to work to no avail until now. Never in a million years did I expect I would need to type a particular word into a particular box to get it to work. By the way, this trick works on Vista as well. My wife's new computer (well new as of two years ago) has Vista on it (what a mistake!) and I have been trying on occasion for the last two years to see her computer from mine. At had all but concluded that networking simply does not work in Vista ... except now it actually does. Some of you may argue that it is not wise to give these permissions to "Everyone", but the security concerns are outweighed in this case simply to get it to work. If you can't use your computer, all the security in the world isn't going to help you. Amazing ... Microsoft has got to be smoking something funny on this one. ~Paul

quit being logical. that will get you nowhere with OOP. the interface is designed to replicate superior human associative reasoning. instead. therefore, it's stuffed-in there obscurely by design. the list can be made to appear via this sequence: [ Add ] [ Advanced... ] [ Find Now ] the same dialog is hidden in advanced sharing too. a secret entry that isn't revealed in the list is: NT SERVICE\TrustedInstaller. it's all right there in the manual. the secret manual.

"By the way this "//ComputerName/Drive not accessible" message has got to be one of the more frustrating messages since it gives me no hints of what the reason might be. It seems that there are many possible reasons, although it looks like I've tried them all." Typically this isnt' the whole message, usually it provides some details as to why (No permission to access the resources) which typically signifies permisssions/security. The actual share would bd \\Server\Share\, are you sure you didn't accidently put in //server/share/ resulting in this error?

It was as simple as adding an "Everyone" group in the security tab.

YOu have to remember that Share Permissions and NTFS Permissions are separate ACLs which combine to give you the effective permission. So if "Everyone" has full access to share C:/Users it doesn't really mean that they have full control permission on all files in Users directory, the local NFTS permissions further restrict access to files/folders same way as if you were accessing locally. When joining a Homegroup, Windows 7 automatically gives "Everyone" user group full control (read and write) ACL to share C:\Users but your files are still protected by local NFTS ACL permissions that you find under "Security" tab. "Therefore due to the Most Restrictive evaluation, the easiest way to set permissions is to provide the Users (preferably by Groups), Full Control on the Share side, but lock it down on the NTFS side (Security Tab). It works nicely, all the time, and is easier to document and keep track." Source: http://msmvps.com/blogs/acefekay/archive/2011/02/04/share-permissions-and-ntfs-permissions-folder-access-control-amp-folder-permissions.aspx