NAS drive not showing on the network after a Windows 11 update

/02 — THE ONE-MINUTE TEST

Reach it by address, and the answer tells you which fault you have

Skip the Network view entirely and go straight to the box. You need its network address — four numbers with dots, something like 192.168.1.50. Your router’s admin page lists every connected device with its address, the NAS maker’s own phone app usually shows it, and many boxes display it on a small front screen or a printed label.

Open File Explorer, click in the address bar at the top, type two backslashes followed by the address — \\192.168.1.50 — and press Enter. One of three things happens.

• The folders appear. Then the NAS is fine and the protocol is fine; only discovery is broken. That is section 03, and in the meantime you can work perfectly well by address. Right-click a folder and choose Map network drive and it gets a drive letter that survives reboots.
• A username and password box appears. The NAS is reachable and talking; Windows just will not let you in as a guest any more. That is section 04.
• “Windows cannot access”, error 0x80070035, or a message about the network path not being found. Either the address is wrong, the box is genuinely off the network, or it is the SMB1 case. Type the same address into a web browser instead: most NAS units have an admin page there. If the admin page loads but File Explorer cannot open the shares, you have found an SMB1-only box. That is also section 04, with a different ending.

Do the test from the PC that updated. If you have another PC or a laptop that has not taken the update yet, trying from that one as well is worth a minute: it tells you whether the box changed or the PC did.

/03 — DISCOVERY

Putting the Network view back

If the address test opened the folders, the NAS is simply not being looked for. Work through these on the PC in order; most people are done after the first two.

• Make the network Private. Open Settings, then Network & internet, click your connection (Wi-Fi or Ethernet) and check the network profile type. After a big update it is often sitting on Public, which is the setting for a café or a hotel and deliberately hides everything. Switch it to Private.
• Turn discovery on for Private networks. In the same Network & internet area, open Advanced network settings, then Advanced sharing settings. Under Private, both Network discovery and File and printer sharing should be on.
• Check the two discovery services. This is the one that catches people, because it looks fine from the settings pages. Press the Windows key, type services and open the Services app. Find Function Discovery Provider Host and Function Discovery Resource Publication. Both should be running, and their startup type should be Automatic (Delayed Start). An update can leave them on Manual and stopped, and with them stopped the Network view stays empty no matter what else you set. Right-click each, choose Properties, correct the startup type, and start them.
• Restart and give it a minute. The Network view fills in as devices announce themselves; it is not instant, and pressing F5 a few times over a minute or two is normal.

If the box now shows but will not open when you double-click it, you have moved on to the next section — that is progress, not a new fault.

/05 — THE BAD ADVICE

The three workarounds the internet will offer, and what each one costs

Search this problem and three fixes come up again and again, each of them confident, each of them quick, and each of them a poor trade. It is worth knowing why before anyone does one of them to your PC.

• “Turn SMB1 back on in Windows Features.” It works today. It is also the protocol at the heart of the ransomware outbreaks that shut hospitals a few years ago, it is a setting for the whole computer rather than for one NAS, and Windows will quietly remove it again after a fortnight of disuse — so it is a fix that breaks itself on a timer.
• “Allow insecure guest logons.” This is a policy or registry change that tells your PC to accept file shares that prove nothing about who is on the other end, from any device on any network it ever joins. It does not loosen one connection to one box; it loosens all of them.
• “Disable SMB signing.” Signing is what stops something on your network sitting in the middle of your file traffic and altering it. Turning it off to accommodate one old box removes that protection from every share the PC touches.

The point is the ratio. Each of these weakens the entire computer to suit a single device that can almost always be brought up to date instead, in about the same amount of time. On a business network the trade is worse still, because the same PC reaches the accounts folder.

If you would rather not spend an evening on it, this is routine work for us: usually one remote session while you watch, or a visit anywhere across Bournemouth, Poole and Dorset if the box needs hands on it.