Mapping A Share Fails to Connect At Startup

Hi ewok

Only CIFS is enabled.

I decided to start from scratch.

I created a new share named "fileshare".

I created two "users" for me and my wife. I matched the users names and passwords to our Windows logon names and passwords. Both of the users are in the default group named "users". Both have 0 quota, and were assigned unique ID's automatically.

The new share was automatically given the the share folder owner name: "fileshare" and the share folder group name: "nogroup". I left everything in the Advanced Options tab as default. so Read/write rights for all choices and grant rename and delete privs is checked.

On the CIFS tab I changed default access to "Disabled". I checked the box for "Write Enabled user and group". I entered my wife and my user names into the write enable users field and the I entered "users" into the write enabled groups field.

Everything is else is default except that I checked "Automatically set permissions on new files and folders" and left all selections as Read/Write.

Now I am almost done copying all of the folders and files from my old share that was having all kinds of problems to my new share. I tested the new share by copying a few folders and files from the old share over. Both my wife and my PC's were able to connect without being prompted for a login/pass so I am continuing to copy all files and folders to the new share.

Here are the remaining issues:

#1 This is not an ideal setup because both my wife and my Windows logons do not use a password so the security is very poor as far as accessing the NAS since the NAS users need the same login/pass as my Windows logons. I can't get it to work correctly any other way so I guess I have to deal with it or add Passwords to our Windows logons which would mean we have to enter them every time we start out computers....

#2 I still cannot map the new share to my PC's. Neither the Windows 7 PC or the Windows XP PC is able to reconnect upon a restart. If I wait a few seconds after they restart and then click on the "disconnected" mapped drive, it opens up just fine....

#3 Instead of mapping the drive I just opened the NAS on the network and created a shortcut to the share. This works. There is a major issue though. Opening up the share in windows explorer for the first time takes about 17 seconds before the contents appear. After that I can browse the files and folders quickly. However if I stop browsing, close the explorer window and try to open it up a few minutes later, I have to wait for another 17 seconds.

The same problem occurs when I add music files from the NAS drive to itunes and try to play, pause and resume them. I can add a song and begin playing it, but if I pause the track for a few minutes and then try to resume play I have to wait 17 seconds for it to start again.

I never experienced any of these problems prior to my factory reset of my ReadyNAS Duo and the installation of my new 2TB hard drives. Connecting to the NAS was always instantaneous. I only ever had to wait for the hard drives to spin up from sleep which took about 2 seconds and once they were awake I could play, pause, resume as much as I wanted.

The only strange thing I notice that is different between my old setup and my new one is that whenever I would access my old setup, whether through windows explorer or Frontview the NAS drives would always spin up if they were sleeping.

On my new setup the NAS drives don't spin up when I try to access the NAS for the first time or when I try to resume playback of a music file. They only spin up if I navigate to a file or folder on the NAS that I haven't visited before. It's kind of like it is using some sort of cache or memory to try and resume where it left off without spinning up the hard drives if that is possible. I don't know enough about it to say what it might be. Do Oplocks have anything to do with that?

Still frustrated with this fiasco. Thanks for all the help.