How do I share the root of a hard drive in Windows 7

[RamBarose]

I can share a folder, but I am not able to share the root of a hard drive. And in my system my Home group is off. Also, even though I have password defense set to 'OFF' I still obtain or get prompted for it from the XP computers on the network, but not the Vista computers. It is really odd. The Windows 7 computers have complete right of entry to the C:\ root on Vista and XP networked machines. But, on the Windows 7 computers the C:\ root is blocked. How do I unlock drives for complete access? I have been working along with permissions in fsmgmt.msc devoid of any luck. What is going on? It should not be so much hard. I have multiple hard drives with hundreds of directories and would have to share each one independently. There must be a way around this?

[Antonio1]

Why does everybody take for granted that the insinuation of sharing the root of a drive is unknown? I obtain it. I understand it. But, yes I wish to share the root of my drives. It is similar to a big giant Microsoft disclaimer every time I hear it. OK, this is the difficulty with Windows 7: I had possession of the drive on the local machine (default), but that is not sufficient. I had to give "everyone" possession of the drive for additional computers to right of entry it. That means logging-in through the network from one more machine to the Windows 7 computer, you have ownership as "everyone" and consequently, permission to right of entry for the drive. So, here is what I did. Right tick on the hard drive from windows explorer. Go to properties. tick on Security. Click edit. Add "everyone" to the group and allocate the permissions you desire. Then go to sharing and share the drive as you would usually. The root of the drive will now be easy to get to over the network. I appreciate it at the present, but this is very poorly explained in all documents I read. I exhausted hour for researching on this and can't understand why MS has made it so difficult to share a drive over a network. It is totally absurd. Hope this help out others attempting to do the similar thing. In a small home network, It is very ordinary/necessary to share multiple drives at the c:\ root.

[Hishem-Remashiya]

Just wanted to provide you a big THANK YOU for posting a solution to this root-drive-sharing difficulty that overwhelmed me all day. You had the answer. Your answer works. You are correct. There are no good documents on this subject. Your answer for allowing the root folder of a Windows 7 computer to be shared and access by Windows XP computers works huge. Thanks for captivating the time to spell it all out step by step. I'm sure many others, appreciate it.

[!Destroyer!]

Thank you for this solution. Sharing the root directories might cause a number of potential issues. For system security, I advise to share the folders in its place of the root directories. If you still desire to share the root directly, please put out of action the sharing and reconfigure the sharing according the steps of the segment “Administrative Shares and Sharing the Root of a Drive”. Later than the steps, please also go to the partition’s Properties, check together Sharing and Security settings, and make sure that you have assigned the “Full-Control” permissions to "Everyone”.