How To Create User Home Folders | Home Directories - Windows Server 2019

This ittaster video demonstrates how to create user home folders (user home directories) in Windows Server 2019. Assigning users 'Home Folders' on a file server provides network users with a dedicate central storage area has a number of advantages include the option to back up user data centrally.
The lab includes:
Creating a root 'Home Folder'
Setting NTFS permissions
Sharing the folder to make accessible over the network
Setting Share permissions
Assigning a 'Home Folder' to a user in Active Directory Users & Computers
Testing 'Home Folder' access from a client workstation.
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[@Patrick_Cashman]

Thank you. This entire series has been extremely helpful. I've started from zero and gotten a domain with shared folder access for users set up with minimal hassle thanks to the thorough and easy to follow steps you've demonstrated here. (caution about using a DC for file storage duly noted)

[@ittaster]

Thanks Patrick! I'm glad you enjoyed the series and found it helpful. Thanks for the great comments too👍

[@kevincastellanos9485]

Still worked for me! IT NOC here, got a free server from work and decided to run my own AD/DC for fun. Thanks for the video.

[@ittaster]

Glad it helped!

[@ittaster]

Hope you find the video helpful! Follow ittaster on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/it_taster Instagram: instagram.com/it_taster Facebook: facebook.com/Ittaster

[@rafaelluisdasilva3504]

You assigned "Domain Users" to have full control of Home_Folders$ directory share. Don't all domain users get permission to read Jon's data in his newly created folder? Thanks for uploading.

[@ittaster]

Hi, Share permissions and NTFS permissions work together. take a look at the short video link below which addresses Share permissions vs NTFS permissions. kzbin.info/www/bejne/e6Wcf5ptgdigl6s

[@jashanjeetsinghsekhon6959]

Thank you sir it was so easy to understand and implement I was able to complete my assignment thanks to you. You are a lifesaver🤩

[@DanTidswellUK]

This was perfect! Thanks so much

[@ittaster]

Thanks!

[@rons7555]

👍video, I’ve been following your earlier videos on server 2016. Thank you for these helpful videos.

[@ittaster]

Thank you, I'm glad you found the videos helpful👍

[@majdaljarbani86]

Thanks for the great video. I want to ask why all users can access all home folders of other users and how can we fix it?

[@ittaster]

Sounds like a possible issue with permissions being inherited/propagated to all sub folders.

[@garycurtis]

Thank you so much, I love the video, very helpful. I have a questions, I am using Windows Server 2019 and it is not accepting the $ do you know why this is or how I can get around this so the other folders are hidden?

[@ittaster]

Hi, the $ only works for the share 'Home$' for example. Which is hidden when users browse shares, but it does appear in the path of a mapped drive.

[@kpmakeup]

Nice video. Im currently in a position where we are using Active Directory and have a company share folder etc. I definitely could learn more in Windows environments, I want to advance my career from Help Desk/System Admin to something else, what should I be studying?

[@ittaster]

Hi, what sort of career direction are you thinking of heading in?

[@mg7670]

Very good explanation, thanks.

[@dongsawyersan3075]

thank you for sharing this knowledge. really appreciate the lessons from you my new friend.

[@ittaster]

Thanks! 👍

[@dimitristsoutsouras2712]

Nice presentation. Its been a while since this video has been uploaded but i am going to going it a try. I happen to follow the same route for home folders even if it isnt the best possible solution. What I mean by that is in a domain with a couple almost hundred + users, this procedure becomes tiring. I am trying to set it up using a GPO but probably I am missing something and doesn t work. Can you make a relevant video? It would be a much more pro way to setup home folders for users.

[@mikek8490]

Always try to use GPO (Group Policy Object) and DFS-Namespaces (Distributed File System) for things such this. Migrate to another Server or Storage aint fun if you use servershares and userprofile configurations. But it also depends on the number of clients which way you choose.

[@lkdipeolu]

Very good lesson. Thanks.

[@amitkhadse7087]

Hi, it's very usefull one problem solved, And please help me if I want share folder which is common for everyone how can avail that folder in user H drive

[@gregorbaric]

Awesome presentation, thank you!

[@afridimohamed7492]

Very Informative. Thank you. I'm setting up the server on our office and your guide is very useful in this process

[@andrewfox7116]

Hello I was curious if you had a video on creating Roaming profiles Thanks

[@alanrivera1913]

Nice video In my organization I have exactly the same but the file server and the active directory server are independent, of 10 users, in 8 that home folder is replicated and in the other 2 it is not, the structure and permissions are fine that I would have to check so that it is replicated without problems in all? I wait your answer thank you!

[@oakridgemechanicalelectric7854]

Thank you so much for posting these videos!!!!! A great help in setting up our systems.

[@ittaster]

Great feedback! Many thanks👍

[@TimothyClarke-f9b]

Hi, I have a quick question. I followed the instructions exactly and I am not able to access he files on the server it self - Logged in as admin

[@ittaster]

Hi, one suggestion to consider is to double check the root home permissions applied to admin (files, folders & sub folders).

[@jaimemontes3619]

thank you for the instructions. it has been very helpful

[@ojurongbelanre]

Absolutely BRILLIANT!!!!!

[@Steve-Norris-t3v]

have a problem i can not solve, I have a small server it was running on Open media vault 5,5 no problem for 2 years, then it updated and everything in the "network" Dir disapared. so i tried OMV V6.0 same problem. so i went for a full upgrade, i installed windows 11 Pro and got Windows server 2022. i have tried everything i can think of, spent weeks on the internet and KZbin, ontime i got one drive to appear in the desktop Explorer after a reboot it was gone. i have set the server as a file server and set the drive share, have set open share all on both units, and still i can not get the server drives to list in the desktop explorer. i have now run out of ideas, can you help please. Steve

[@zt.5677]

Thanks ITtaster! If I add more users, do they appear in the same home folder as separate folders along with Jon? And have the same permissions? Can we do all of this in PowerShell?

[@ittaster]

Hi, yes that's correct. Maybe take a look at my video about creating a user template it fits in with this very well. You can also do this using PowerShell too. Powershell is a a good approach if you have lots of users to set up or import from a .csv file for example.

[@zt.5677]

@@ittaster Hello. Thanks. Yes, that is the way: .csv files and Powershell. Together with the server GUI, but later only PS, as only Win Server Core will be available.

[@RoshanZakky]

hi there i have a small problem in my domain client one particular website is not working properly same time some other websites are working nicely can you pelase let me know whats the issue thank you

[@jasonwalker7166]

Followed along with you- at 9:30 - you went to your client PC and the share drive appeared automatically.... when I did it - there was no share drive displayed automatically. I had to map it. Using Hyper V - Server 2022.

[@ittaster]

Hi, it's ok to do that. But it shouldn't be necessary to map the home drive.

[@phungomathoho3578]

you are my IT Guy,Thanks a lot

[@ittaster]

Thanks Phungo! I really appreciate your kind comment👍

[@charocan]

Great video it is so helpful 😊

[@bicivelo]

worked like a charm! Thanks you!!!!

[@JC-ex5ve]

So good! Please more more

[@WassimBM]

Thank you, very helpful and easy to learn and practice videos :)

[@ittaster]

Thanks👍

[@kg3474]

very well explained!

[@tanmayhaldar8827]

Thankyou so much Sir 👏🏻

[@carbonfossile4219]

well done

[@ndimageryanddownoutproduct1071]

How do you do this for a domain and user that already has an account and aren't creating from new

[@ittaster]

Hi, if the user already exists, select user properties and specify the home directory in the same way (6:08).

[@papierbndc]

Lets just say I have 2 Drives on My Server I have a C Drive and a Z drive Both drives will have a users folder in the first directory... How does the server know which drive I pick for jon?

[@ittaster]

Hi, the user's home folder is 'mapped' to the share (home directories folder) on whichever drive the folder is created.

[@papierbndc]

@@ittaster ah I see... thanks Im in a IT-Aprenticeship and we are learning to configure a Windows server 2022 at the moment... your tutorials are really helpfull rn thanks for making this awsome content

[@ittaster]

Many thanks for your kind comments! I'm glad the videos are helping👍

[@zt.5677]

Hello Jon. Thanks for this video. I have followed and checked every step in this video, but none of the user linked folders appear in the client network as a shared folder. Not one. On the server side everything looks perfect, but when I log in to the client PC: no shared folders. I did turn on network discovery on the client PC for all the users. Any ideas what to check? All permissions are correct (for the best of my knowledge). Thank you. The users are in security groups within OUs. Does that change anything? Being in a sec. group should not disable sharing, should it?

[@ittaster]

If the home directories appear on the server, I would possibly check permissions by logging onto a client as the user and trying to access the home folder by typing the share path 'run'. If that doesn't work check your share and ntfs permissions.

[@zt.5677]

@@ittaster Ok Thanks. (When I am finished, I shall give you a feedback on the situation, if you don't mind.)

[@zt.5677]

Dear Jon. No luck with the setup. Perhaps something is wrong with the network settings: discovery and rules.

[@ittaster]

It's worth checking the basics, see if you are able to ping the server IP and hostname including FQDN. If successful, then possibly check if you can access the home folder share from the client computer. \\servername\homefolder\username . If this fails it's likely to be a share / ntfs permissions issue

[@thortielemans532]

@@ittaster I was having the same problem today. I followed your instruction but it did not work. The only difference was that I wanted to use the drive letter H: and this seems to be the problem. What I did is I tried to manually map the folder in the explorer on the client and noticed the drive letter was not available. The chosen drive letter was already reserved for a usb port for a flash drive but not visible in the explorer. As soon as I changed the drive letter in the user profile to one of the available ones it works. Easy and understandable when you know it.

[@asiballoon]

Thank you so much man ❤

[@georgedemos1581]

Very good video!

[@guangtingzoeli8330]

what can I do if I only have C drive? How to add another drive there?

[@ittaster]

Hi, is a good idea to partition your drive when you install server, this allows for the OS and other (for example data) to be contained in a separate away from the OS. Other partitions and drives can be created using disk manager.

[@guangtingzoeli8330]

@@ittaster ok thank you for your reply. so nice.

[@carlbailey50]

Thxs John.

[@tvd6860]

I keep getting a notification 'Unable to access the network share' 'The user's password must be changed before signing in.' But I deselected all the password setting when creating the users... Could you help me out please?

[@ittaster]

Hi, there are a couple of possible reasons for this. If 'user must change password' is selected in the users account properties, this will prompt for a new password during sign in. If you're unable to access the home folder network share, carefully check the user's group membership, share permissions and ntfs permissions. hope this helps.

[@whiz-code]

Mmmmmm the video helped me. Thank you

[@samuelveen7047]

SUper nice

[@SuperChelseaSW6]

Hello sir. What if the H: drive located in server 1 get filled with data, what do we do?

[@ittaster]

Hi, File Server Resource Manager (FSRM) is a useful tool that enables network admins to set storage quotas and manage user data. It's included with Windows Server. There are a couple of videos covering the basics on my channel that may be of interest.

[@BrianSendaula256]

I love it😌

[@AbhishekKumar-cq1wy]

Sir how to create a server for ms access database

[@danishdude6750]

Just create a file server and put your database file on a share with the appropriate access 😊

[@guangtingzoeli8330]

Hi, do you know why my client pc account name does not shown on log in page?

[@ittaster]

Hi, the client PC name would normally appear when you login to the PC using a local account. The PC name won't appear when you logon to a domain.

[@guangtingzoeli8330]

@@ittaster ok, I figured out the problem, I forgot to set up client pc system to join the domain.