Password oddity when accessing 2000 Server from XP machines

[Mitch]

Hello,

User accounts with passwords on XP Pro workstations are prompted for
logon and password to connect to a 2000 Server shared folder.

User accounts without passwords on XP Pro workstations are not
prompted for anything.

Also, I cannot map a drive on the XP workstation to a share on the
2000 Server, (it will not even show up) when logged on to a user
account with a password on the XP machine. The reverse is true when
logged on without a password.

When a password for the same XP account is removed, no problems.

Obviously, a simple peer to peer network with full access to the whole
enchilada to everyone. This only recently manifested itself at six
different locations. No changes have been made to the 2000 Server
machines, so I suspect some type of Windows update causing the
problems.

No software firewalls of any kind are installed, including
Microsoft's.

Ideas?

Thanks,
Mitch

 

[Star Fleet Admiral Q]

Don't know how you configure your peer-to-peer networks, but it certainly
don't work that way in my neighborhood. The two things that make a share
immediately available without a userid/password would be:
a) Guest has been enabled on the machine hosting the share (Bad).
b) The userid/password accessing the share from the remote is the same on
both the host and the remote (Good).

--

Star Fleet Admiral Q @ your Service!

http://www.google.com
Google is your "Friend"

 

[Mitch]

Don't know how you configure your peer-to-peer networks, but it certainly
don't work that way in my neighborhood. The two things that make a share
immediately available without a userid/password would be:
a) Guest has been enabled on the machine hosting the share (Bad).
b) The userid/password accessing the share from the remote is the same on
both the host and the remote (Good).

Well, your neighborhood is the continuum, so you naturally don't have
these issues.

Seriously, the share (in fact the whole c drive) is shared on the
server. There is absolutely no need for security in these networks of
any kind. Guest has been enabled, so it doesn't matter what the
userid/password is from the remote machine..or so I thought.

The odd thing is that this configuration has been used for almost
three years now, and nothing has changed or been added to our
knowledge. All of a sudden, the same behavior manifested itself at six
different locations. In fact, I can't even access a share on the
server when logged in as administrator from a remote system without
being prompted for logon and password, if and only if administrator
has a password set. Remove the password, no problem, share is
accessible, drive mapping works, everything.

Can't you just snap your fingers or something to make it work?

Thanks,
Mitch