Share-level mapped network drives are not connected after you restart your computer

When you restart your computer that is running Microsoft Windows XP Professional, some of the earlier mapped network drives may be disconnected. A red "X" appears for the network drives that are disconnected.

This behavior may occur if all the following conditions are true:

• You have a computer that is running Microsoft Windows 95 or Microsoft Windows 98 as a network file server in Share-level access control in a peer-to-peer network. By using share-level access control, you can supply a password for each shared resource.
• You have multiple shared folders on the computer that is running Windows 95 or Windows 98, and each shared folder has a different password.
• From the computer running Windows XP Professional, you connect to more than one password-protected folder that is shared on the Windows 95-based or Windows 98-based computer.
• You select the Remember my password check box for each folder that is shared on the Windows 95-based or Windows 98-based computer.

This behavior occurs because when you connect to a Windows 95-based or Windows 98-based computer that has multiple password-protected shares, Stored User Names and Passwords (Credential Manager) only remembers the password for the last shared folder where you connected.

To work around this behavior, manually reconnect the network drives that are disconnected. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Right-click Start, and then click Explore.
2. In the left pane, click My Computer.
3. In the right pane, double-click the network drive icon with the red "X" displayed on it.
4. In the Connect to \\computer name\shared folder name dialog box select the user name from the User name list.
5. In the Password field type the password, and then click OK.

This behavior is by design.

Stored User Names and Passwords is a feature of Microsoft Windows XP that stores user names and passwords for servers. With this feature users can connect to servers with user names and passwords that are different from those that are used to log on. The user can store these user names and passwords for later reuse.

Note Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition lacks the Stored User Names and Passwords feature for network share connections. Windows XP Home Edition stores only Remote Access Services/Virtual Private Networking and Microsoft .NET Passport credentials.

For additional information about Stored User Names and Passwords, click the following article numbers to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: