Windows 10, mapping drive unreliable, slow or fails

Hi Dorset_tx, thanks for letting know. To control some of the parameters of protocol SMB through the graphical ui you might want to checkout app "smb plus". If you already are using that, don't feel bothered.

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Dorset_tx wrote:

 

I think Win 10 resolves names via DNS or WSD by default. The root cause is probably something to do with the DNS config of my router meaning the NAS doesn't always get registered. 

 

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The NAS will respond to WSD discovery requests. 

One alternative to enabling SMB 1 is to go to the TCP/IP properties, and look at the WINS tab.  The WINS configuration will be blank, but there are a couple of netbios name options lower down.  It defaults to getting netbios names from DHCP (not the same as DNS), but you could also try setting netbios over TCP/IP and see if that helps.

In any event, ping -a nas-ip-address will show you the hostname that the PC has (if any).  But I have seen times where that resolves correctly, but \\hostname in file explorer still fails.

There are some fairly recent reports with Windows 10 failing ping with case-sensitive names.  They are a bit inconsistent - some saying that their systems only work with ping NAS (uppercase), others saying that it only works with lowercase or mixed case (ping nAs for instance).  So that's another thing you could look at.

FWIW, Windows network discovery of linux systems has been hit-or-miss in Windows for a long time (well before Windows 10).  I've gotten into the habit of just using the IP address (and have set up shortcuts that do that on our family PCs).

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Dorset_tx wrote:

given that SMB1 has been deprecated because of its poor security & exploitation by malware possibly not a good idea on a portable device that gets connected to other networks in its travels.

 

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Normally Windows will classify those networks as public (certainly the wifi connections), and on public networks SMB defaults to off.