Microsoft Is Retiring the Windows Homegroup

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rgMekanic

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With the latest Windows Insider build of Windows 10, Microsoft has killed off "Windows HomeGroup." Originally a part of Windows 7 in 2009 and continuing until now, HomeGroup was a way to share files and devices between computers on your network. This change will go live in the Spring 2018 update to Windows 10.

Really does not phase me at all, except I'm happy to have less bloat on my machines. The handful of times I've tried to use HomeGroup it simply failed miserably compared to just sharing over the network without it. Quote below is from Microsoft's Blog post on Insider Build 17063.

Whether it’s connecting PCs and printers on your home network via the Share functionality in Windows or using OneDrive to share a photo album of your last vacation, Windows 10 makes connecting multiple devices and sharing content streamlined and simple. And it’s because of that evolution that with today’s build you’ll start to see us retire the HomeGroup service.
 
Just rebuilt 3 machines and they've updated. I've been trying to figure out why homegroup wouldn't connect. Guess this info was out there somewhere and I missed.

Thanks for the post rgMekanic!
 
I've been using homegroups for a while now. It simplifies sharing for the rights restricted, like group policy in a way.
 
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I think the whole point of a homegroup versus a plain old workgroup was that you could enter in a password once per machine to join the homegroup, and then everything automagically shared. I guess that was a good idea for the average user - but I never found it difficult to nagivate the network to the machine in question and then just type in credentials for that machine... People who could do that didn't need homegroups, and people who couldn't do that were probably never going to get the whole networking thing figured out anyway.

Now it's honestly so much easier to just dump the file or whatever into dropbox or equivalent and then pick up the file on another device of your choosing (iOS, Android, Mac, Linux, windowsX, etc.) I think they are right to kill it - unnecessary complication.
 
Never really saw a reason to use Homegroup as opposed to just setting up actual share/NTFS permissions. But maybe for an average joe it made sense.
 
You mean there's another way to share printers and files and stuff? Does the update undo existing homegroups? Pretty sure my Windows Home Server still uses that. I am server illiterate.
 
I had this weird issue with Windows 8 where DLNA would not work unless you create a homegroup. Didn't happen on 7.

Either way, glad it's gone.
 
I never found a reason to use this. Want to share crap? Then make a folder on each computer, call it public and set the rights for anyone to read/write to it. If it's only accessible on the home network then who cares?
Then give your own account read/write access to your entire harddrive and you can access it from any other computer in the house including linux.

Homegroup sounds like a solution for people who don't even understand what files are.
 
It really did create more problems that it solved. I hated having to support people who used it and borked up their computer because they had no idea what they were doing.
 
This kind of sucks since after building a new PC for the Father in law he had me spend a couple of hours googling shit to fix his home group...

I tried to show him easier ways since he just has a few external HDDs shared on his home network. “But I want it to be on my Homegroup!” He says. Eff me.

Looks like I’m booking another service call at his place in a few months.
 
never really had problems with homegroup or workgroup.

But homegroup does not work like I would have preferred it to
For some reason on my file server, i cant share to "Homegroup" which I would love to be able to
I have to do "anyone"

But i never liked how windows handled file sharing after win9x wher you could but in a freaking password on the login instead of having to mangage users
 
TheHig said:
This kind of sucks since after building a new PC for the Father in law he had me spend a couple of hours googling shit to fix his home group...

I tried to show him easier ways since he just has a few external HDDs shared on his home network. “But I want it to be on my Homegroup!” He says. Eff me.

Looks like I’m booking another service call at his place in a few months.
Click to expand...

1. Set Ethernet (or Wifi) to Private on all PCs.
2. Change advanced sharing settings to "Turn On file & Printer sharing" and set to "use user accounts" rather than HomeGroup.
3. Under All networks, turn off password protected sharing.
4. Share the folder(s) or drive(s) necessary. Modify the security tab to add the Everyone object and set to read or modify permissions for Everyone as needed.
5. Enable the share using advanced sharing and make the Share permission for Everyone match the NTFS permission.

Map network drives or make shortcuts to \\hostname\share as needed. Boom, all done. Perfect for a flat, no-security home network. As long as his Wifi isn't open or shared with neighbors, then only people ON his network would be able to get to the shares. No password prompts ever, no need to have a user account on each machine with the same user/pass or anything like that.

Best security? No. But its the easiest way to make a basic home network have easy sharing if you trust all people and devices on the network.
 
MrTroy03 said:
1. Set Ethernet (or Wifi) to Private on all PCs.
2. Change advanced sharing settings to "Turn On file & Printer sharing" and set to "use user accounts" rather than HomeGroup.
3. Under All networks, turn off password protected sharing.
4. Share the folder(s) or drive(s) necessary. Modify the security tab to add the Everyone object and set to read or modify permissions for Everyone as needed.
5. Enable the share using advanced sharing and make the Share permission for Everyone match the NTFS permission.

Map network drives or make shortcuts to \\hostname\share as needed. Boom, all done. Perfect for a flat, no-security home network. As long as his Wifi isn't open or shared with neighbors, then only people ON his network would be able to get to the shares. No password prompts ever, no need to have a user account on each machine with the same user/pass or anything like that.

Best security? No. But its the easiest way to make a basic home network have easy sharing if you trust all people and devices on the network.
Click to expand...
Precisely this.

When Homegroups came along in Win7, I did use it for my parents (and it DID work without issue, in my case) but then it was more curiosity. After an update broke something, I just went with the same method you listed.

We have to concede though that whilst most here would have no problems doing the above, homegroups was an attempt to provide a similar functionality to those who simply have no idea where to start.
 
Well this has to be a first. Them removing a feature that no one will miss.
Now if only they'd add a feature that someone had asked for.
 
My main PC I'm sitting at also functions as a media server on top of my NAS.

Disable password sharing, right click and share the folders I want to stream to other PCs, done.

I never have company (I am not a fan of people) so I'm not worried about other people being on my Wifi, and if by chance I'm forced to have a Christmas party here or something, I have a guest network isolated from all my shit.
 
Tried it once to connect two Win7 PC file shares when Windows 7 1st came out. Then found it didn't work with Linux, so went back to samba file shares and never looked back.

I sure seemed like one of those features that MS included to just to say "we have this new feature over WinXP", but it really didn't do anything for the home user.
 
Something I used to use a lot but for internal home networking between Windows PCs standard shares work fine and aren't as finicky and the cloud is simpler and more powerful for sharing to the outside.
 
I had it working for a while, then I couldn't remember the original password and couldn't figure out how to reset it. I use a NAS at home and have a share - so really wasn't an issue. Just glad to be done with it now. It could have been a good idea, but just didn't seem to work reliably.
 
I wish Linksys still made Network Magic that was super easy to use.
 
Really no longer needed for most folks even if it worked correctly. Most printers are network connectable so don't need a host PC to share and NAS appliances are cheap enough for those that have a lot of files to share but don't want a full server setup.
 
While no fan of the homegroup, this is another feature of windows 10 that'll be taken away from users by a forced update.
 
So I guess I was the only using this? It is a simple way to set up sharing between Windows devices. Just enable and navigate where you want to pull or upload items from. It'll be so much easier to go to each computer now, create a public folder, and set permissions for everyone.

I got rid of my home server when W7 came with this function. I can't imagine how this was difficult for anyone. Really. If Homegroup was a challenge for you, just simply ask your state appointed caregiver to set it up for you. ;)
 
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AaronGant said:
While no fan of the homegroup, this is another feature of windows 10 that'll be taken away from users by a forced update.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Non-tech-savvy home users who have a mixed Windows 10 and 7 environment, who were using Homegroup successfully, will be left in the lurch. This is just another way Microsoft is forcing people to install Windows 10 on all devices. This should piss off all of us who are go-to free tech support for friends and family, because it'll result in more unpaid work for us for no good reason.
 
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Dear God, thank you.

I can't recall how many times we set a computer in charge of the group only to have it detach or someone get denied....

So many LAN memories
 
Thank God
Windows home group and workgroup are way too easy to hack.
 
TheHig said:
This kind of sucks since after building a new PC for the Father in law he had me spend a couple of hours googling shit to fix his home group...

I tried to show him easier ways since he just has a few external HDDs shared on his home network. “But I want it to be on my Homegroup!” He says. Eff me.

Looks like I’m booking another service call at his place in a few months.
Click to expand...
Dude get him a NAS and mount it to the router. Then have every computer mount the nas drive as a network drive

That's what nas is for!
 
EODetroit said:
Exactly. Non-tech-savvy home users who have a mixed Windows 10 and 7 environment, who were using Homegroup successfully, will be left in the lurch. This is just another way Microsoft is forcing people to install Windows 10 on all devices. This should piss off all of us who are go-to free tech support for friends and family, because it'll result in more unpaid work for us for no good reason.
Click to expand...

Give me $250 and I'll set them up a NAS with automated backup (they provide drives). Problem solved
 
FINALLY. I have hated the dumb homegroup thing ever since it was first put in Windows.

I tried it a few times and it always caused problems.

And every time you hook up to a new network it wants you to join a homegroup.

This should have been killed off years ago.
 
Thank god. This was a horrible idea. I literally never used it. I could never really find a good reason to use it, even at "home". If anything, I found it actually more confusing to configure...
 
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