Home network disappeared from PC resources

Irish Stones

Hi everybody,
I'm in a strange situation.
I never, or nearly never switch my desktop PC off. I just turn the monitor off when I'm not using it.
I haven't been using my PC for 5 days. Now I have turned the monitor on and found that a Windows Update had my PC to turn off and restart. The windows and apps I was working on have been closed.
The worst thing is that I don't see my network anymore. I have a QNAP NAS connected to the PC through a Netgear switch.
When I would open the PC resources I would see the network tab with my PC, the TP-Link Archer D7 modem router and the NAS. The NAS was seen and accessed like a normal mass storage device.
Now I can only access it through the web interface. I don't see my PC either in the network structure.
I can only see the TP-Link router, which I can access through its web interface.
Could you please help understand what happened, what I have to check and how to restore the former situation? It is very important!!!
Thanks!

Irish Stones

No luck yet, my NAS isn't in the network.
I found a workaround and created a shortcut on the desktop. The NAS was visible at \\NAS_name.
For an unknown reason Windows decided that my network was public and for safety reasons removed the NAS from the structure.
I forced the network as private, but Windows is still not convinced, so it doesn't allow the NAS in the local network.
Apparently, until Windows thinks my local networs is not safe it won't show my NAS in the resources.
Any advice is still welcome

CatInABox

Windows 10 sometimes updates the networking protocols for various reason, sounds like that's what's happened here.

Try this, something I found after a quick google:

Win+X -> Control Panel->Network and Sharing Center->Change Adapter Settings
Right click on the Network Adapter->Properties
Click to select Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) -> Properties ->Advanced->WINS
Click to select "Enable NetBIOS over TCP/IP" then click OK.

Make sure to pick the right adapter(i.e. the one you use to access your network, like a wired or WiFi), and then restart to make sure it's taken effect.

If it doesn't work, then make sure to change it back. Not sure why they changed it, but they've been getting more ruthless on anything that compromises security, even at the expense of annoying people.

Irish Stones

Thanks CatInABox, I'm at work now, I will try this tonight when I go back home and tell you how it worked.
Thank you.

Alun

It's all down to recent Windows updates that have disabled SMB v1, an old and insecure version of the protocol used for file sharing in Windows networks. It's also used by the mechanism responsible for maintaining a list of available network resources, a rather clunky and unreliable system whereby one device in the network is chosen, or 'elected', as a so called Master Browser.

Windows file sharing will still work using the more up to date versions of SMB, v2, and v3, but the whole network browsing thing still relies on SMB v1.

There are good reasons to keep SMB v1 disabled, most notably the risks to data on your network if you ever get infected by some of the recent ransomware trojans like Wannacry.

Irish Stones

Alun, so you are saying not to follow CatInABox's advice?

Irish Stones

CatInABox, it didn't work, nothing changed

Alun

Irish Stones wrote: »

Alun, so you are saying not to follow CatInABox's advice?

I won't do any harm, but I don't think it's the problem.

As I explained Microsoft have decided a) to deprecate the use of SMB v1 due to some serious security vulnerabilities, and b) to not upgrade the flaky, unreliable browser service to support newer more secure versions of SMB.

Now, it is possible to re-enable SMB v1 on the latest Windows 10 build, but do so at your own risk.

Go to Control Panel (the old one, not the Settings app!) -> Programs and Features -> Turn Windows features on or off (in menu to left of screen). Scroll down to SMB 1.0/CIFS File Sharing Support and re-enable it.

I wouldn't advise it though, and creating a shortcut to the NAS on your desktop is a much safer option, especially if it is the only server in your network.

Irish Stones

Alun wrote: »

I wouldn't advise it though, and creating a shortcut to the NAS on your desktop is a much safer option, especially if it is the only server in your network.

Alright, I won't do it.
The shortcut that I created is good enough for my purposes, although less handy.
For instance, I won't be able to save stuff to the NAS from the file manager because The NAS isn't directly visible.
Just out of curiosity, when did Microsoft decide that the previous solution was unreliable/unsafe?
Did it happen in the last few days?
Because until a few days ago, say 10 days ago, everything was still fine on my PC, then on 15th I found this surprise, and the last time I used the PC as I knew it was on the 10th December.
In the middle there was an update.

CatInABox

Irish Stones wrote: »

Alright, I won't do it.
The shortcut that I created is good enough for my purposes, although less handy.
For instance, I won't be able to save stuff to the NAS from the file manager because The NAS isn't directly visible.
Just out of curiosity, when did Microsoft decide that the previous solution was unreliable/unsafe?
Did it happen in the last few days?
Because until a few days ago, say 10 days ago, everything was still fine on my PC, then on 15th I found this surprise, and the last time I used the PC as I knew it was on the 10th December.
In the middle there was an update.

Ah, I see what you're saying now. You should still be able to map the network drive, so that instead of looking for it in the network section, you'd find it in the "This PC" section.

Here's Microsoft's guide to mapping a network drive. You should be able to find the name of the share on the NAS drive admin page.

SMB1 has been under fire of quite some time now, so everyone has been looking at getting rid of it. I didn't think Microsoft were going to remove it from existing installs, only fresh installs, so I actually think that this problem is something else. However, I don't think that the "Network" section of explorer is all that useful, as I've always had problems with it. I always map my NAS drive, as I generally find it faster, going into Network usually results in it trying to find everything on my network again.

Alun

Irish Stones wrote: »

Alright, I won't do it.
The shortcut that I created is good enough for my purposes, although less handy.
For instance, I won't be able to save stuff to the NAS from the file manager because The NAS isn't directly visible.

You can map a drive to a network share without being able to see the server in the Network part of Explorer. Make the ribbon visible at the top, select the Computer tab and there's a Map network drive option. Just select the drive letter and type in the network share name, e.g. \\My_NAS\Music by hand.

Just out of curiosity, when did Microsoft decide that the previous solution was unreliable/unsafe?
Did it happen in the last few days?
Because until a few days ago, say 10 days ago, everything was still fine on my PC, then on 15th I found this surprise, and the last time I used the PC as I knew it was on the 10th December.
In the middle there was an update.

I think it came in with build 1709 but I'm not sure. If you never switch your pc off normally, depending on your settings, you may have been on the previous version 1703 for some time.

Irish Stones

CatInABox wrote: »

Ah, I see what you're saying now. You should still be able to map the network drive, so that instead of looking for it in the network section, you'd find it in the "This PC" section.

Here's Microsoft's guide to mapping a network drive. You should be able to find the name of the share on the NAS drive admin page.

Alun wrote: »

You can map a drive to a network share without being able to see the server in the Network part of Explorer. Make the ribbon visible at the top, select the Computer tab and there's a Map network drive option. Just select the drive letter and type in the network share name, e.g. \\My_NAS\Music by hand.

Thanks, I did as instructed and it worked rather fine, I mean, I was only able to map one or more folders in the NAS not the whole NAS.
However I have got what I needed.
Thanks a million