Win10 Update - Disable Guest Account - Cannot access samba share on server

[JavaWiz]

Yesterday I updated my Windows 10 installation with the Anniversary updates, and to my disappointment, all my PVR clients (RaspPi running LibreElec-Kodi) using SAMBA to access server shares stopped working. The message indicated my shares on the Windows 10 server were no longer accessible.

In the past, to keep things easy, I leveraged the Guest account (on windows server) to allow my clients access to my PVR recordings on the windows server. By default, now Windows 10 has removed the Guest account, however the privileges still exist.

Hopefully this post will help you avoid a frustrating triage experience -

Here's how I got it working again, the following commands are run on the Windows 10 NextPVR server hosting the video files:

1. CMD prompt:
   • Net Share - This command will list the existing shares you have setup. Locate the directories that you have shared out for your client access
     
   
   
2. Using Windows Explorer, one-by-one, locate the directories being shared, right-click and select properties
   • Click the "Sharing" tab
     
   • Click the "Advanced Sharing" button
     
   • Click the "Permissions" button
     
   • Click "Add" under Group or User Name list box
     
   • Type in "Guest" (no quotes) in the text box and click "Check Names"
     
   • Click "Ok"
     
   • Adjust the proper privileges for Guest (Usually Change and Read are sufficient) and click "Ok"
     
   • Click "Ok" on the Advanced Sharing dialog
     
   • Click "Close"
     
   
   
3. Once you have set Privileges for each shared directory, you need to enable the Guest Account
   • In Cortana Search box, type "edit group policy" and open the Local Group Policy Editor
     
   • Drill down to: Security Settings-->Computer Configuration-->Windows Settings-->Security Settings-->Local Policies-->Security Options
     
   • Double-click on "Accounts: Guest Account Status" and set to enabled, Click "Ok"
     
   • Close down the Policy Editor.
     

Your clients show now be able to access the NextPVR server shares again!

[Graham]

In Cortana Search box, type "edit group policy" and open the Local Group Policy Editor

Group Policy Edit is not part of Windows 10 Home edition ... A Google search for "windows 10 home group policy edit" found a zillion suggestions about adding it ... but I can't say whether any of them work.

[2leftfeet]

Group Policy Edit is not part of Windows 10 Home edition ... A Google search for "windows 10 home group policy edit" found a zillion suggestions about adding it ... but I can't say whether any of them work.

I did download one of those gpedit additions, installed it on W10 home, and it actually works.

[jksmurf]

I did download one of those gpedit additions, installed it on W10 home, and it actually works.

Me too and it allowed me to follow steps 1~3 as above (which I did several weeks ago), as per the marked 1/2/3 below.

However I have a subsequent query, as my Samba Shares are apparently not being accessed by guests.

Reading and around in gpedit.msc, there are also User Rights (e.g. Allow log on locally and Deny log on locally) which I have left unchanged, as below.

However I have inadvertently removed one user right, which was "Deny access to this computer from the network"; the default was guest.

My questions are these:

1. What do your Group Policies show here; and
   
2. IF this is STILL Guest on yours (as mine originally was), when I attempt to add it back it no longer adds just "Guest", it adds Smurfpc/Guest, can I assume this is NOT an issue?
   
3. IF this is STILL Guest, where do you find the password and username for guest (there is no user 'Guest' under user accounts, at least not in Win10 home), that I can then use to add to access the Samba shares?
   

Thanks a lot

k.

[Apologies I cannot seem to order the attachments to match the order of the text]