Windows Network Drive Mappings

Owned by Sebastian Saladiak
Last updated: Jan 18, 2024
3 min read

Group Policy is leveraged to control Windows network drive mappings on MiWorkspace / PaaS devices.

 

It's critical that a computer object in Active Directory is placed in the proper OU, or it will not receive the correct GPOs. This should be the first step in troubleshooting a Group Policy issue.

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You can view the location of objects in Active Directory Users and Computers (ADUC). To do so, however, you must first enable advanced features. Under View - ensure that Advanced Features is checked.
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Then search for the computer and open it. Under the Object tab you can see in what OU the computer object is located.

 

A second way to troubleshoot GPO issues is to open a command prompt and force Group Policy to update by typing:

gpupdate /force

This can provide a lot of information. If you're submitting a ticket to MiWorkspace Engineering about a Group Policy issue, please provide a screen capture or verbatim record of the results of this command. You can also run a command such as:

gpresult /z > c:\temp\result.html

This will create a dump of all of the group policies that have applied to the computer. You could also attach this to a ticket.

 

A third way is through the Event Viewer. Open the Event Viewer and navigate to Applications and Services Logs, Microsoft, Windows, Group Policy, Operational. The messages in this log can be very helpful. Further, if you right-click on Operational, you can save the log to a file and attach it to a ticket.

 

General steps to follow when troubleshooting Windows network drive mapping issues:

  • Is the user account in the right Active Directory groups that give access?

    • AD groups grant access (NTFS permissions)

    • AD groups are used by Group Policy to map the drive

    • These groups might be different in some cases - ensure proper memberships

  • Is there an event in the Application Event Log that explains what is happening?

    • Successful and failed events are recorded

    • Use Event Viewer to look for an event

    • No event often means not in the AD groups

 

The Windows Helper App includes some basic drive mapping troubleshooting help:

  • Get drives currently mapped by clicking Troubleshooting > Network Drive Status

  • Attempt to remap all drives by clicking “Reconnect Network Drives”