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I have windows 8.1 and its tied to my Microsoft login. I only vaguely remember setting this option up during the installation of windows. When I try to use these credentials to connect to my network share I cannot login.

E.G. \\computerName\c$

It will not accept my credentials. When I run whoami at the command line I see a different account. I don't recall ever setting up this other account.

whoami = domain\me (password unknown if I ever even set one up...)
Windows Login = me@email.com (password known, does not work with RDP)

What do I need to do in order to login to the network share?

P.Brian.Mackey
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12 Answers12

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You must use MicrosoftAccount\me@email.com (this MicrosoftAccount prefix is important) as username.

enter image description here

Now enter your Microsoft account password into the password box.

magicandre1981
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  • Can you clarify MicrosoftAccount? Is that verbatim? AFAIK my Microsoft Account name is me@email.com. So I don't follow. – P.Brian.Mackey Apr 11 '14 at 19:39
  • yes, type it as written there and use your email address. This **MicrosoftAccount** prefix is used to tell Windows 8 that you use a MS online account. – magicandre1981 Apr 12 '14 at 06:21
  • have you tried this or not? – magicandre1981 Jul 03 '14 at 18:35
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    This does not work either... – Matze Sep 24 '15 at 06:21
  • @Matze for me it works. Which issue do you have? Which Windows do you use? – magicandre1981 Sep 24 '15 at 16:00
  • @magicandre1981 I use Windows 10 Pro; and I try to connect to a Windows 8.1 machine... on both machines I use the same Microsoft-account. The machines are not in a domain; do I need to specify the machine name somehow, like I would do if I use a machine account? – Matze Sep 25 '15 at 15:53
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    @Matze look in the "Computer Management Console" under Users. Here Windows created also an account. In my Case André. I can use this name with the old machine name style. Try this. – magicandre1981 Sep 26 '15 at 05:28
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    @Matze I tried to connect from Windows 7 to Windows 8.1U1 with only me@email.com as the username. It worked. I tried it for both file sharing and RDP. (Of course, I had to enable RDP and add me@email.com to the list of allowed users. But it worked.) –  Jul 31 '16 at 08:02
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    Windows 10 on both side. This worked for me. – Juha Palomäki Oct 24 '16 at 09:26
  • @JuhaPalomäki you're welcome, this is expected and works fine for me. I have no idea why it fails for the 2 other users. – magicandre1981 Oct 24 '16 at 15:27
  • This doesn't work for me. Two Windows 10 Pro computers, both connected to the same homegroup, both logging in with the same Microsoft account. I am unable to access \\OTHER\Users\me from either source computer. – Micah Zoltu Sep 15 '17 at 20:53
  • it works fine in Win8/10 for me and others, so you do something wrong. – magicandre1981 Sep 16 '17 at 06:06
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    This doesn't work for me. Both my desktop and laptop use same Microsoft account, and only from laptop to desktop can administrative shares be accessed. When trying from desktop to laptop I get challenged and the explicit declaration as MicrosoftAccount\me@domain.com keeps failing. – icelava Aug 27 '18 at 19:17
  • @icelava this works for me since Windows8, I have no idea why it fails. – magicandre1981 Aug 28 '18 at 14:51
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    Turns out a custom registry key needs to be inserted in the destination computer. https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/b1da2536-ba9b-4153-8719-7cc18fb927af/can-access-administrative-shared-folders-on-one-computer-but-not-the-other-way-around?forum=win10itpronetworking – icelava Sep 07 '18 at 10:20
  • @icelava this is a different issue – magicandre1981 Sep 07 '18 at 13:53
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    I'm pretty sure this won't work if 2FA is enabled for the MS account. What an oversight. – bviktor Jul 20 '19 at 21:08
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    Insane. This actually works. @bviktor It does, in fact, work even with 2FA. – Aloha Nov 09 '19 at 03:44
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    If you are attempting to connect to an admin share such as C$, you must also set the LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy registry setting as explained in another answer here and at https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-server/windows-security/user-account-control-and-remote-restriction – Glen Little Nov 12 '20 at 19:26
  • This answer, by definition, cannot work. When trying to create a username in Windows, you are limited to 20 character. The "MicrosoftAccount" MicrosoftAccount\MongomeryBurns@outlook.com uses up 18 character alone; leaving 3 for a username. That is just not realistic. – Ian Boyd Mar 09 '22 at 04:25
  • this works fine for years, troll somewhere else. – magicandre1981 Mar 09 '22 at 06:43
  • Did you even try it: https://i.imgur.com/urQd3SE.png. And even if i tried only entering the me@email.com, you're not allowed to have @ in your username: https://i.imgur.com/EZycJkP.png. So don't go running your mouth. – Ian Boyd Mar 09 '22 at 14:39
  • don't create a new user, simply add the account data into the credentials dialog. I added a picture to show it extra to you. – magicandre1981 Mar 09 '22 at 18:13
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    If you are using PIN/face/finger and recently changed your M$ password, you must log in to the target computer at once using a password to be able to log in (to RDP or shared disk) remotely. – BLuM Dec 20 '23 at 09:11
  • Didn't work for me accessing from a mac. Had to create a local Windows user (no M$ account tied), give that access to both the folder and share and then use those credentials. – Jos Jan 16 '24 at 10:06
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Try disabling PIN login for the Microsoft Account (Settings > Accounts > Sign in options > PIN). Windows rejected my credentials until I removed the PIN, then I could sign in just using my email address.

Alyce
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    4 years later... Thanks! – sdive Apr 27 '20 at 19:57
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    This worked. How stupid is that! – Peter Lehnhardt Apr 19 '21 at 08:13
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    I wish there were some way to keep pin login and still connect to samba :( – Almo May 01 '21 at 15:54
  • As long as pin and passwords are valid sign in methods, there's no point in removing this. I am really surprised it works now. Many many thanks. – Paulo Pedroso Nov 25 '21 at 18:33
  • Accessing the share using the solution provided by @magicandre1981 then disabling the PIN login credential option on the share host, then rebooting the share host is what got us working. Also make sure "Only Allow Access to Local Accounts" is disabled. – dan Dec 27 '22 at 18:33
  • If the option to remove PIN is grayed out, you need to disable the "For improved security, only allow Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft account on this device", close and reopen the panel – Jean-Francois Rondeau Feb 25 '23 at 00:39
  • This works for me too. You basically need to remove all Windows Hello login methods (PIN, face recognition, fingerprint) – Leo Zhuang May 02 '23 at 18:13
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Figured it out. I was able to access a network share using my Microsoft account. This is the format:

  • Username: email address tied to your account
  • Password: password that you use to login to your Microsoft account online. Not the PIN
Anonymous
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    This is the same answer already given and accepted and does not add anything. Please refrain from posting when you are not actually adding anything to the discussion. – music2myear Jan 21 '17 at 00:31
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    @music2myear no the top answer specifically says to add "MicrosoftAccount" to the beginning, which didn't work for me. I removed it per this answer and it worked. – Ben Baron Feb 28 '19 at 00:58
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    I can confirm that with Windows 11 as the OS from which you connect, this works with just the Microsoft account email and password. I also found that I had to use my former password to connect successfully, as it seems Windows did not update its internal credential store during the months leading up to me trying this – Will Nov 22 '22 at 06:17
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I created a local "dummy" account with admin privileges and use it only as a login for sharing.

Steve Parker
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  • This seems to be the easiest way to make it work. Thanks for the tip though unfortunately we have to resort to something like this. – xji Nov 02 '21 at 08:53
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If you used Microsoft Authenticato‪r when you log in to Microsoft Account and use PIN to unlock your PC, switching to local account and logging in to Microsoft Account again using your password may fix the problem. You can just use the password and ID of Microsoft Account for SMB.

kurema
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Had the same login problem with my Windows 10 desktop and came across this page. After digging around, I found a solution that works on Windows 10 Pro 21H1. I can log in from a Windows 10 computer, my QNAP NAS, and my Macbook Pro.

  1. Login name is your Microsoft Account email address user@email.com.
  2. Login password is your Microsoft Account password.

If the above does not work for you. Check the following:

  1. Go to Settings -> Accounts -> Sign-in options, ensure Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts is turned off.
  2. Once it is turned off, make sure Password is enabled in the Manage how you sign in to your device section on the same setting page. You may need to close the Settings page after turning the Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts option off.
Alwyn Pan
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I had a similar problem, but was not even asked for my credentials before being denied access. It took me a while to figure this out, so here's what I had to do:

  • I previously tried home groups. Didn't like it, deactivated it.
  • I added the Microsoft Account user and logged in as that as well.
  • ... however, that didn't yet work: the home group left some HomeUser group and credentials scattered in my system. I had to remove the HomeUser group and Credentials and (maybe after a reboot?) it finally worked.
Tobias Kienzler
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  • Deleting HomeGroup and HomeGroupUser from local accounts as well as removing them from credential manager then restarting fixed this for me! Thanks! – Micah Zoltu May 31 '19 at 07:41
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In my case the problem was the User must change password at next logon setting on the user account, which apparently gets checked by Windows automatically when you convert a local account to a Microsoft account.

To revert this:

  1. Go to Computer Management > Local Users and Groups > Users.
  2. Find your user account and open its Properties.
  3. Uncheck User must change password at next logon.
  4. Check Password never expires. <-- This is important, otherwise the unchecking above doesn't stick.
Paul
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  • Thanks, this worked for me. I am surprised why others have not tried this method. This worked even without disabling PIN login in Windows.

    After doing this setting, both usernames worked:

    Microsoft account username (ramsingh@live.com) and Ram (local account's folder name found in C:\Users)

     – ePandit Dec 26 '21 at 04:42
  • Is that still possible with Win11 (Home edition)? I don't see any local user/group management options in Computer Management. – RJVB Jan 24 '24 at 19:53
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Only thing below that worked for me after have tried all solutions in here.

From Gautam.75801 on social.technet.microsoft.com :

I got the Access is denied issue solved when i tried to access a Netowrk share on another computer

ex \\192.168.1.0\c$\

It seemed to be a UAC issue. The below Link helped.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/kb/951016

We will need to add a new DWORD

Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then press ENTER.

Locate and then click the following registry subkey:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System

If the LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy registry entry does not exist, follow these steps: On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.

Type LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy, and then press ENTER.

Right-click LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy, and then click Modify.

In the Value data box, type 1, and then click OK.

Exit Registry Editor.

Adelscott
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  • This enables Guest sharing which means that your shares are no longer password protected. This is not recommended at all and moreover doesn't solve the problem at hand. – Ashhar Hasan Aug 06 '18 at 19:13
  • @AshharHasan do you have any references that confirm that this is the case? – Holistic Developer Apr 11 '19 at 03:49
  • See https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-server/windows-security/user-account-control-and-remote-restriction – Glen Little Nov 12 '20 at 19:27
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I manage to overcome this by mapping from command line. Ex.: net use s: \tower\movies

Hope it helps

Miguel Pereira
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Don't have enough reputation to comment, but the answer by @Steve Parker worked great:

  • Create a local user account
  • Add it to the root folders you want to share (like my Users\username account in this case)
  • Add the local user account's credentials into your SMB client (in my case ES file explorer)
Willster419
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I just found a better solution. Go to your "C:\Users" folder and record the name of your personal folder. Use the name of your personal folder as account name. i.e. if your ms account is Tom.ABC@abc.com, then your personal folder might be called "tom", and you should be able to access your shared folder with account name "tom" and your MS account password.

yugi
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