DGalt Posted December 21, 2011 Posted December 21, 2011 I have an HTPC running Windows 7 Home premium that's connected to my unraid server via an airport extreme router and a switch. I recently had to rebuild my HTPC, and this problem started occurring. It was not occurring prior to the rebuild, so I think there are just some settings in Windows that I originally changed that got reset on the rebuild. So the issue is basically this: every time I reboot the HTPC, upon start-up it tells me it cannot connect to all my network drives. If I go into my frontend (MediaPortal), I can't play any of the files. Rather, I have to go into "Computer" directory and open each of the mapped drives to get the computer to "see" the drives. And then I can play whatever I want. I'm sure it's a relatively simple fix since I didn't have any issues setting this all up the first time through, but for the life of me I don't know what it might be. Thoughts?
Frank1940 Posted December 21, 2011 Posted December 21, 2011 This happens to me occasionally. My server currently runs FreeNAS (until I can make the switch to unRAID) so the problem is not related strictly to unRAID. I don't have a positive answer but the I think it revolves around your windows machine not locating the Local Master Browser which resolves computer names (like "TOWER") into IP addresses. Normally, my server ends up being the master browser because it is always on. In my memory, the issue seems to occur mostly when the server has been down and the 'election' of a new master has not been resolved. The other thing that could be occurring is that there is 'race' between a couple of processes and your win7 machine has not yet located the master browser before another process attempts to make the connection. It could just be that the order in which the various services and startup programs initiate has changed as a result of the rebuilt and this is the source of your problem. I don't know where you got your win7 machine but if it was a commercial built, it probably came with a goodly load of 'trial' software. If you eliminated some of this in the rebuilt, the faster boot might be the cause of the problem.
evans036 Posted December 21, 2011 Posted December 21, 2011 under 'settings' in the 'indentification' section there is a 'local master' setting. changing that to 'yes' may help. good luck, steve
DGalt Posted December 22, 2011 Author Posted December 22, 2011 well the first thing I always do when setting up a new (commercially bought) PC is removing all the bloat that comes with it this only occurs when the server is sitting idle...i.e. if I had just been playing a video file, and reboot, my computer doesn't have an issue seeing it. The server is set to by the local master (if I'm thinking about what you're talking about), since it's what I reboot least often. A bit of googling implied this may the result of some windows firewalls settings, but I haven't had a chance to check yet (at work)...and even if it is, I'm not entirely sure what particular settings might be causing this (I remember when I first set everything up I did change some things in the firewall and in the network sharing settings because I was having issues connecting, but that was primarily to the other PC in my apartment, not to the server) I'll play around with it some more when i get home, but if anyone has any other ideas I'm all ears
DGalt Posted January 13, 2012 Author Posted January 13, 2012 So, I know this is an old post, but I finally got around to fixing it. It had something to do with the Windows Firewall, I'm guessing some setting in there was causing the issue. Turning it off solved it (seeing as I'm not too worried about security on my HTPC)
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