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I need to map a network drive over VPN.

Very simple host network: no Microsoft server, no AD. Just one router and a NAS appliance (simple Linux file server).

When at the office, I can map a drive letter as follows:

net use f: \\192.168.1.3\MyShare /User:MYSELF mypass

However, when try same command over VPN, I receive the response:

System error 1244 has occurred.
The operation being requested was not performed because the user
has not been authenticated.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

Two identical Cisco WRVS4400N VPN routers create the VPN. Router1 in office (192.168.1.1), Router2 in soho (192.168.11.1). VPN works perfectly, no client software required. When at SOHO (behind router2 with an IP address of 192.168.11.100), can successfully ping 192.168.1.3.

Routers have latest firmware.

Over VPN I cannot browse network via Windows Explorer (Win7 Network Neighborhood shows only my PC as opposed to several PCs and the NAS box "NAS01" when in the office).

Over VPN, I cannot connect by entering \\192.168.1.3\MyShare into Windows
Explorer's address bar (although I can do that successfully when at 
the office).

Over VPN, I am able to view the NAS administration screens via
https://192.168.1.3/admin and I can print to the office TCPIP printer
(192.168.1.222) -- both non-routable IPs.

ADDITIONAL EDIT:

Thanks for the important hints and clues as to where to look for the problem.

Windows 7 Home Premium, which is on my laptop, exhibits this behavior.

A different laptop, installed with Windows7 Professional, works fine.

Is it likely that Win7 Home vs. Win7 Pro is the problem? If so, is there any way to overcome this limitation without upgrading to Pro? (i.e. Registry changes, configuration settings, copy over certain files from Pro to Home, etc.)

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  • How are you creating a VPN tunnel, is there any user authentication taking place?
    – onxx
    May 15, 2012 at 23:39
  • try net use f: \\192.168.1.3\MyShare /User:<hostname of nas>\MYSELF mypass
    – leepfrog
    May 16, 2012 at 0:05
  • otherwise use /User:domain\username
    – onxx
    May 16, 2012 at 4:31
  • The VPN is created between the routers (branded as "VPN Routers"). Authentication is between the routers. When in SOHO, over VPN, I can print to the office printer (192.168.1.222). This must be related to SMB or ?
    – cssyphus
    May 16, 2012 at 13:44
  • Thanks for the idea Leepfrog, but it didn't work. Entering: [[ net use f: \\192.168.1.3\MyShare /User:READYNAS01\MYSELF mypass ]] resulted in error: [[ System error 1244 has occurred. The operation being requested was not performed because the user has not been authenticated. ]]
    – cssyphus
    May 16, 2012 at 13:45

2 Answers 2

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If the NAS has some sort of "restrict to local network" option, that might be worth looking into. Otherwise, there's a possibility that there's some sort of firewalling happening on the VPN link. And finally, as everyone has noted, make sure you're authenticating as a user that exists on the NAS. You may need to specify NASHOST\nasusername rather than just nasusername.

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  • Thank you for the thoughts. User does exist on the NAS (identical command works locally, i.e. not over VPN). Doesn't seem to be a firewall problem. Looks more like WINS or SMB or ???, but I'm not sure how to approach resolution.
    – cssyphus
    May 16, 2012 at 16:21
  • Good observation, Jon. Problem now appears to be firewall-related. Firewall on Windows7 Home Premium laptop. On XP machine, over VPN, can connect, map drives, no problem. On the Win7 laptop, however, simply disabling the Windows7 firewall does not solve the problem. I'm now wondering if it's a Home vs Pro problem.
    – cssyphus
    May 17, 2012 at 2:43
  • home editions typically do not have very good network drive mapping support (they're designed for home use where simple, ie no security, sharing is used). we used to tell our users that we won't support XP home installs for drive mapping for this reason since most of the time we couldn't get it working. in our instance we just set up a terminal server for them to use, but of course the cost means that's not for everyone :) May 18, 2012 at 7:13
  • Thanks Jon. How good are the "in place upgrades" Win7 Home to Pro? Under XP, I recall that clean-disk installs were the way to go.
    – cssyphus
    May 18, 2012 at 17:58
  • Clean disks are sometimes better, but in-place upgrades should in theory be fine. If there's little or no cost to clean installing I generally do that, but otherwise it doesn't really matter as far as I know ;) May 21, 2012 at 3:49
0

Mea Culpa.

Due to a lack of alternate machines for testing, I continued to believe the fault to be Windows 7 Home vs. Windows 7 Premium. I was wrong.

For some reason, the Win7 Home laptop had a 3rd party firewall installed on it (ZoneAlarm Free). However, although ZoneAlarm was running, there was no icon for it in the system tray and the Windows Firewall also was turned on. Of course ZA showed up in the "Programs and Features" list, but I didn't look there. I assumed I knew what was on the laptop.

Uninstalling ZoneAlarm Free solved the problem for the Windows 7 Home Premium laptop. Jon's answer about firewalling was, therefore, correct.

My apologies to all who joined in the collective head scratching.

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