My Computer showing tonnes of network shares

[howartp]

Hi,

 

When my technician goes to My Computer, he sees tonnes of network shares (645 including his proper network drives) under the heading 'Network Location', some of which don't even exist any more.

 

Anyone come across this? Anyone know how to stop it?

 

Peter

[Michael]

Maybe the shares are not mapped anymore (as a drive letter), but the shares still exist.

 

If they can be removed, you need to unshare the folders (in turn) and then they'll no longer appear.

 

On your server, navigate to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Shared Folders > Shares.

 

This'll show you the physical path on the server where the shares are located. You can right click the share and select 'Stop Sharing', but you'll still need to delete the folder itself manually, so make a note of the physical location beforehand!

[howartp]

Sorry Michael, I only meant some of them don't exist any more.

 

The majority of them are current valid student user areas, my colleague just don't want to be seeing them every time he goes into My Computer because it takes ages to enumerate them.

 

The question is how to not-view shares on the network, not how to remove old shares.

 

Peter

[Michael]

It's generally recommended to make user areas hidden and this is done with a dollar sign. I suspect most are user home areas:

 

\\SERVERNAME.DOMAIN\USERNAME$ would do the trick.

 

You can do this with any share though as you require.

[howartp]

They already are hidden...

 

Peter

[cpjitservices]

Can you just go and unmap the drive from My Computer ?

 

If I open My computer now I have 6 mapped drives- any I or my colleagues don't want to see we just right click and "Disconnect" them.

[Michael]

I'm not quite sure how you're seeing hidden shares, without typing them in manually. This is the whole point

[howartp]

Ok, that's a screenshot of My Computer, with paths blacked out.

 

Some are user shares, ending in dollars, some are normal shares.

 

3rd column, 8th icon down (inc the proper drives) clearly says 'c$ on....'

 

Believe me now?

 

Peter

[Roberto]

These are shortcuts to previously visited locations. I think you can remove them this way

 

cut and paste this location into an explorer address bar and hit return: %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Network Shortcuts

If the shortcuts there look like the ones in question, get deleting.

Enjoy $beverage of choice.