Can't Connect to Remote File Share from Windows 7 PC to Windows 2012 Server

RDP and file sharing are completely independent of each other. You might have RDP permission, or even administrator privileges, but that doesnt guarantee access to a file share.

If you cannot access a file share, more than likely you do not have access permissions to the share. Ask your local administrator/help desk to confirm the issue and resolve it.

Keltari

Posted 2015-02-09T15:10:43.193

Reputation: 57 019

I have administrator rights on the machine. When I RDP into it what settings should I be looking for? I checked around and could not find anything related to letting an account hit a file share. Is this something that has to be set up in AD or something? – Brady – 2015-02-09T15:27:58.980

1http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithmayer/archive/2012/10/21/ntfs-shared-folders-a-whole-lot-easier-in-windows-server-2012.aspx – Keltari – 2015-02-09T15:33:14.257

just google file sharing, just remember there are TWO sets of permissions to deal with: share permissions and file permissions. – Keltari – 2015-02-09T15:34:06.613

File permission is allways the stronger bind. – Ivan Viktorovic – 2015-02-09T15:35:27.130

Maybe I phrased my question wrong. I don't actually want to create a file share, I know how to do that. What I want to do is to be able to hit the machine's root drive via Windows Explorer. – Brady – 2015-02-09T15:46:39.520

if you have administrator access, all you need to do to get to the C drive would be \machinename\c$ That is assuming certain defaults werent changed – Keltari – 2015-02-09T15:48:20.423

@Keltari That's exactly what I thought, but it's not working. I know I'm hitting the correct machine because it asks me for the creds, but the same creds I use for RDP aren't working to hit the C drive. – Brady – 2015-02-09T15:53:25.223

@Brady then 1) you are not an administrator or 2) administrator shares are disabled. Either way, it sounds like you do not have enough knowledge in this area to safely tinker. I highly recommend you talk to someone in your company that knows what they are doing. This setup might be on purpose. Talk to your local admin. – Keltari – 2015-02-09T15:58:35.950

@Keltari Well, I am the local admin of this particular box. This is a non-production server and it's really just a test server. My career and specialty is telephony bridges, not Windows Servers, but I'm more than confident that I can figure this out. You have to start somewhere right? – Brady – 2015-02-09T16:03:18.263

Well read the link I posted and google windows server file sharing... – Keltari – 2015-02-09T16:07:15.850

@Brady - You have local Administrator permission that isn't the same as being an Administrator of the domain. You being the local Administrator isn't enough to accomplish your goal. – Ramhound – 2015-02-09T16:19:29.267

@Keltari I appreciate the link however it only explains file shares and not accessing the remote server's root directory. I can do this with Windows Server versions prior to 2012 without any extra setup so the domain piece must be the issue. – Brady – 2015-02-09T16:25:31.220

@Ramhound So the account has to be able to authenticate across both domains, not just on the local machine itself, in order for this to work? How come that would be the case if I'm only trying to authenticate against the local machine? – Brady – 2015-02-09T16:26:45.630

First of all we need to know what exact right you have on the maschine and if the maschine is a domain controller or not. If the maschine is not a Domain Controller you could be a local admin OR a domain admin. Never the less i think we cant answer your question because its lacking a lot information and im not sure we can figure out all stuff without starting a big discussion. So i would recommend first to read basic information on server 2012 and active direcotry. Of cause you cant learn everything reading books but you may should look for a Windows related discussion bord/forum – Ivan Viktorovic – 2015-02-09T22:14:06.950

I'm a local admin on the server. The machine isn't a DC.

I ended up just creating a shared folder, but I still don't understand why I can RDP into the machine but when I try \\[machine]\c$ in Windows Explorer the same credentials I used to RDP won't let me hit the file structure. – Brady – 2015-02-09T22:21:33.957

Do you have access rights to that folder? if you dont have them of cause wont be able to connect to the share. – Ivan Viktorovic – 2015-02-09T15:21:49.627

@IvanViktorovic the account has admin rights for the host machine. – Brady – 2015-02-09T15:28:50.650

Having admin right does not mean that he can access all stuff. You still need to have rights on the share. Look for the data and shareing center and then look for the share. Check the rights of the share and the ntfs rights. If you have no clue what youre doing and you have admin rights on a server then you shouldnt trying to to stuff. Please just contact an admin. – Ivan Viktorovic – 2015-02-09T15:32:53.080

@IvanViktorovic This is a non prod server. I'm the only real admin that works on it, mostly for fun. The Corp IT admins don't touch the machine unless they need to preform upgrades. Besides, you gotta start somewhere right? – Brady – 2015-02-09T16:12:50.147

Having local Administrator rights is useless in a domain setting. Does this user have the correct rights on both domains? – Ramhound – 2015-02-09T16:18:00.073

Can't Connect to Remote File Share from Windows 7 PC to Windows 2012 Server

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