[Solved] Vista and removing the need for a password to access a share

Hi,

Starting to pull my hair out. recently found that my shuttle box had become riddled with virii when my wife did some surfing. In order to protect the half terabyte worth of data I deleted the primary partition (OS and software installs) and then virus scanned the data drive.

All is going well. Managed to install most of the software.

I use this shuttle box as my media server. It is connected to my linksyst router whcih I inturn connect the other devices around the house into.

I had the shuttle (now on referred to as my "server" ) set up so that selected directories on my D: drive were shared, so that anyone could access them. I have a firewall and other software installed the other side of the router, which negates the need for something internally (or at least that's the premise I work under)

Since the re-installation I have bee unable to share the folders without being prompted for a username and password.

On the Network and sharing centre I have set up as folllows:

I have a workgroup called BUZZNET, which is set up as a private network

Network discovery = ON
File Sharing = ON
Public Folder sharing = ON
Printer Sharing = ON
Password Protected Sharing = OFF
Media Sharing = OFF

I have gone to the folders I wish to share, and right clicked and selected properties

On the sharing tab I have then selected SHARE
I have then added EVERYONE in as a co-owner

I can see the folders remotely but I still have to enter a username and password to gain access.


Help!!!

I enabled them, then logged off, and now it works.

HOWEVER, whenever I log on to that computer now, Guest is an account that someone can log on with. Can you hide that account so that you can access it once you are on the computer, and not to log on with? It wsn't here before.

Maybe I just hd the same users and usernames set up on the server as on the other computers on the network, with the same passwords?

I've done that. When I power on the server, it gives me the option to log on as guest.

I changed the password of the user account and this now works

ie on the server I have an account called Account1, with password Aardvard
on pc1 I have an account called Account1 and that had a password Dangermouse

Now that I've alligned the passwords to both be Aardvard, the shares work. I think this iswhy it was working before, but I'd not realised it.