Recommendations: User login configuration (1 Viewer)

[DocGolden]

I'm looking for thoughts/recommendations on how others have cofigured their user logins on their MediaPortal HTPC. I've been looking through the forums & have not managed to find any items that relate directly to this.

Right now, I have a MCE 2004 box which I'm moving to MediaPortal. MCE's default config is to just use Administrator w/ no password. But since I've got several other PCs on my network & am managing user permissions for my shares, this default behavior leaves a bit to be desired.

So, what are others doing? Are you running a single user login, or do you have multiple users set? Do you create a 'MediaPortal' or 'TVUser' login?

Thanks!

 

[moullas]

You have to be more specific...

1) If you want to connect to your HTPC and that has no admin pass, then you can change the local security policy to allow connecting through the network even with a blank password.

To do that, go to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Local Security Policy

Then from there go to ->
Local Policies -> Security Options
and find the setting that says
"Accounts: Limit local account use of blank passwords to console logon only" and set it to "Disabled"

2) If you want the HTPC to connect to other computers that have Admin passwords set then just make sure that in Windows Explorer folder options you set the "Use simple file sharing" options to disabled (unticked).
That will prompt the computer for a username and password when you attempt to connect to another computer that has a pass, and then you can enter it there and save it, thus storing the authentication.


Hope i've helped... if that's what you wanted to do..?

 

[Mr.WOP]

What you also could do....

Create all the users that you need.

Run "control userpasswords2"

Select the user to login with and deselect "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer"

 

[DocGolden]

moullas - my apologies for not being specific enough. My main reason for asking this is to find a good method for using Remote Desktop to log onto the PC for updates & configuration changes. Trying to work from the screen on a TV is painful at best. Since you must have a password to login via Remote Desktop, an administrator account that auto logs in due to no password doesn't work for Remoting. However, adding a password then becomes a pain since I (or my wife) would have to login after each reboot.

Looking to the future, I could see several users on my network trying to access resources on the pc, and I'd like to handle permissions nicely w/out having to wipe the box & start over.

Mr.WOP - thank you for your suggestion. This will help w/ the passwords, but doesn't necessarily resolve my login problem after reboots since I'd likely still need a password.

 

[zswman]

I haven't used remote desktop so I am not completely sure what that buys you. This has been my preferred method of accessing PCs on my network.

http://realvnc.com/

 

[tein]

Doc.Golden - Mr.Wops suggestion will in fact solve the problem you've described. It let you have an account with password that autologin when you boot the computer.

But I can see another (smaller) problem - in my experience, when you log out from remote desktop you must login on the console manually. The easy solution to this is of course to reboot the computer instead from logging out from remote desktop.

 

[moullas]

ocGolden, the thing with the Local Security Policy *should* allow you to log in the box without having a password set on your admin account...

However, a VNC solucion (like Tightvnc) should be better imo, since it wont log your user out from the HTPC, thus requiring to press anything on a keyboard after working remotely

 

[OleBent]

If I understand what you are trying to do this might be a way of achieving what you want....

Create the (local or domain) user you want with a good password.
Use i.e. TweakUI for WXP from MS to set auto login info.

Then you have no prob login into your box using RDP using the credentials afterwards.

At least above method is what I´ve been using here.