Outlook and Network keeps asking for Password

I've actually had this issue in my network for several years. Though it has appeared in various different forms and has reacted differently to different "solutions."

My first encounter after a user changed their password, they could no longer access the network, open outlook or get online (since we used a proxy.) So I clumsily did a quick fix, which I knew would work, I hit IE and it prompted me for credentials. Why did I use IE though and not just any other form like Outlook or UNC to access a share--since they would too ask me for credentials with a login prompt?

Well the difference in IE, it actually gives you an option that the other two prompts dont, which can be seen here. As you can see, it has a nice little check box that lets you tell it to SAVE the password so it will stop harrassing you. I discovered that since it was saved there with the login prompt IE gave, it also eliminated the rest of the prompts from appearing in Outlook and while accessing shares. So I said, w00t! I knew it was a dirty fix but it worked and didn't have time to mess with it.

The next time the same users changed their passwords, I had the same issue. Though it was no longer because of the previous issue (which I still didn't know why or what caused it) but now it was because even after changing the password, while they attempted to access any resource, the saved password from before would still be attempted as a login and of course it would fail.

So what I had to do was (from what I remember) is get into the control panel and in the users control panel go to advanced and delete the saved passwords in the "manage password" area. Mind you, sometimes I would see credentials stored on there and sometimes not--which made it much more frustrating.

Now another form of this problem came with only Outlook asking for credentials. The user could access shares and stuff just fine, but Outlook would ask them for a password every time they opened it.

Since the other prompts (IE and shares) did not come up, I could no longer do my dirty work around of telling IE to save the password, so I had to find another way. The way I found was to give the user a new Outlook profile by using the Mail applet in the control panel. You know how to do that so I wont go into it. And just making it default into the new one (or completely delete the older one and re-create their outlook profile). That seemed to work so I kept doing it.

Now recently I've been getting another variation of this same credential issue. Right after the user had changed their password, upon reboot, their mapped drives could no longer connect (because of an authentication problem) and Outlook continued to ask them for credentials. Strangely though, IE would work fine for them (maybe because I removed authentication from the proxy server.)

Anyway, before the new fix I figured out, if they wanted to access their shares or mapped drives, they had to double click on one of the mapped drives that had a X on it and it would prompt them for password and user name. They would enter it and it would let them pass, until the machine was rebooted, same process.

So I finally took the time today to narrow this issue down further since it was springing up like daisies! After several tries at deleted temp files, and weird folders from the users profile, I finally slimmed it down to two folders named, "Credentials."

One is located here:

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Microsoft\Credentials<---

And the other here:

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Credentials

I did not have a chance to slim the issue down to just one of the folders though. I was not aware after renaming those folders it needed a reboot so I was merely testing the fix with logoffs. But it is now certain that the problem lies in either of these folders if not both. They contain empty folders that are named after SIDs of specific users. Once I deleted them (or you can rename them to .OLD or whatever) and rebooted, I had the user login, the process re-created these two folders, but with only one folder which I assume is specific to that user. Their mapped drives automatically connected and Outlook opened up smoothly. No more credential prompts.

I am still not sure what is causing this, but at least now I have a simple fix, a much cleaner one than recreating profiles, or saving passwords.

Also, the cause of this very well may still be repercussions of my first dirty fix...I am not sure, but I will keep my eyes peeled for this one. I really couldn't find a solution for this problem of mine. I found many solutions but none of them worked for my situation. So hopefully you will find this documented issue useful.