I am running Windows7 Enterprise the 90 day trial version on my computer and when I set it up I mapped my network drives that are coming from my 2 servers that I have onsite. One of the servers has Windows Server 2008 on it and the other has Windows Server 2003 on it. For some reason when I leave my computer for a long time and I come back I have to log back into my computer and this is when the Red X shows up over the mapped network drive from the server running Windows Server 2003, but its only for that mapped network drive and not the other that is from the server running Windows Server 2008. When I click on the network drive it says that it can't connect and when I do the diagnostics it doesn't find anything wrong, but I can always remote into that same server from my desktop. The only way to rectify the problem of not being able to connect using the mapped network drive is to restart my computer and then I'm able to access the mapped network drive again. Can anybody help me with why this is happening? What can I do to change this behavior?

You can change related setting in Windows Server 2003 to disable the auto-disconnect. Mapped Drive Connection to Network Share May Be Lost If the issue still occurs, I suggest you disable firewall on both the server and client side. If the issue does not occur the firewalls can be the root cause. Additionally, although the mapped drives disconnect after a while, you should be able to reconnect them by simply launching the drives. In this case the issue can be caused by authentication. I suggest you change the NTLM authentication level in Windows 7. Also you need to change the NTLM authentication level in Windows 7. Network security: LAN Manager authentication level Please change the NTLM authentication level to “Send LM & NTLM - use NTLMv2 session security if negotiated”. Please refer the following article.Arthur Xie - MSFT

I tried and did what you said, the firewalls on both machines were already disabled so I don't think that was a problem. Now that I've followed your directions the thing now doesn't have the Red X on it but I still can't access the mapped network drive from the Windows Server 2003 computer while I'm on the Windows 7 computer. Every time I click on that mapped drive a window pops up and it reads, "Microsoft Windows Network: The local device name is already in use." Then the very next line in that window says, "This connection has not been restored." In order to restor it am I going to have to restart my computer? Is there another way to restore it without restarting my computer? Is there any other changes in the system that I should look to make?

You may read the following article. You may receive the "The local device name is already in use" error message when you try to restore a network mapping connection to a shared network folder on a Windows XP-based client If it is your case, you may recreate one of the drive mappings if you change the connection. If you only use local area network connection, please let us know if you have changed the NTLM authentication level that was suggested in my previous post. Also please let us know if the drive is mapped to a NAS or a physical drive in a computer. Arthur Xie - MSFT

I've changed the NTLM authentication level to what you suggested earlier. Its a drive is mapped from the computers that are running Windows 7 to a physical drive in the server that is running Windows Server 2003. I've also checked the firewalls and didn't find anything there either because they were already disabled. The other thing is that I've set the server so that it doesn't time out. Thus far I don't get anyone calling me saying that it gives them that error message as much anymore, although a few is still telling me that they get that message, but on mostly everyone's computer in my company now has the red X over the mapped drive. What else can I check?

I too have this issue. I have 2 2003 DC's, one is just a BDC, the primary server has Exchange & file sharing. Mixed Mac and PC's, mostly XP Pro, but also two Windows 7 Professional, and after some arbitrary time period, the 7 machines get the same error and have to restart to get network access. I'm thinking this is a Server 2003 setting to be changed, as I have many other clients with server 2003 and Win 7 with no issues.

Arthur I didn't get my problem fixed. I'm now running Windows 7 Professional on all of the computers and the server is running Windows Server 2003 here in the office and the shared network folders still diplay a Red X over top of the icon after it sets idle for a while. When I click on the icon the error message says, "The local device is already in use". It won't ever reconnect with the server unless I restart the computer. If I restart then everything is fine. How do I fix this?

w_washington wrote: Arthur I didn't get my problem fixed. I'm now running Windows 7 Professional on all of the computers and the server is running Windows Server 2003 here in the office and the shared network folders still diplay a Red X over top of the icon after it sets idle for a while. When I click on the icon the error message says, "The local device is already in use".  It won't ever reconnect with the server unless I restart the computer.  If I restart then everything is fine.  How do I fix this? Have you ever tried to restart explorer or to rerun your logon script or to disconnect and then remap your disconnected network drives? What domain functional level is your server using and is your server up to date with patches? Wolfgang

w_washington, Have you checked this angle: Mapped Drive Connection to Network Share May Be Lost http://support.microsoft.com/kb/297684 I have also seen this occur because of Symantec System Center http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932463