"Failed to get authorization to access your account" message on Windows Roon Remote - [Solved]

Last week I completely rebuilt my Windows 10 PC from the ground up. Previous to this I was able to back up my Roon database to a folder on a USB drive attached to the system. Since the rebuild I get this warning when I try to backup to that same location which Roon will browse to happily, just not write to:
Capture
All my other networking is running as it’s supposed to. I can find all the other devices on it and browse to their folders but Roon is asking for authority to write to the pre-existing database backup folder. The worst of it is there is no username or password required to gain access to this or any other shares so what is Roon looking for and what, potentially, is the configuration variable that has been reset in the Windows rebuild?

Hello @Alan_McMillan,

Thanks for contacting support, I’d be happy to assist here. It seems that this could be a permissions issue to me, do you by any chance have read/write ability to that folder? If you right-click the destination folder where you intend to save your backups and go to Properties, is “Read-only” by any chance checked?
Read%20Only%20Folder

I have also seen a report that SMBv1 is disabled by default in Windows 10, can you check to see if enabling this setting helps, as per this thread?

Please let me know your findings when possible.

Thanks,
Noris

Hi @noris
I’ve checked both these items and there is no difference. The same error comes up.

Hello @Alan_McMillan,

Thanks for confirming that the above two suggestions haven’t resolved the issue. I just want to confirm a few things with you here:

  • Are you able to create a new folder on the drive using Windows Explorer and copy a file to it?
  • What is the File System format of the USB drive, NTFS or something different?
  • Do you by any chance have a Firewall blocking access to Roon on the machine? I would check the Antivirus or Windows Defender settings and make sure that Roon is on the “allowed” list.
  • Are you logged in with a local Administrator account? On the Microsoft forums (last post) I saw a report that using a local Admin account has different privileges than using a Microsoft Admin account.

Please let me know if any of my above questions/suggestions help.

Thanks,
Noris

Hi @noris
Answers to your questions appended below:

  • Are you able to create a new folder on the drive using Windows Explorer and copy a file to it? Yes
  • What is the File System format of the USB drive, NTFS or something different? NTFS
  • Do you by any chance have a Firewall blocking access to Roon on the machine? I would check the Antivirus or Windows Defender settings and make sure that Roon is on the “allowed” list. Roon is explicitly permitted access
  • Are you logged in with a local Administrator account? I saw a report that using a local Admin account has different privileges than using a Microsoft Admin account. I am the administrator for the machine and I do not have and never have had a Microsoft account. The files are all under my ownership.

If you tell roon to backup to a different folder does that work?

Hi Ged
No it doesn’t. I’ve tried pointing Roon at every drive I’ve got attached to the PC (there are nine of them) and none of them have access authority. They all throw up the same error.

Permissions can be a real pain in this state.
Might be worth creating a new local windows user and loading roon under that ID to see if that is different - might distinguish user from app permissions.

I agree. Microsoft permissions in particular are an indecipherable mess!
I’ve just created a new user with admin rights and the error issue when pointing Roon at the backup folder was the same as before. I’ve even given the everyone group full control over the folder’s read and right access and that STILL wasn’t enough to give Roon authority to access the thing!

Don’t suppose you have another PC? Try a new msft local user and a new room install and account (trial account?) And see what happens.
Or more usefully wait for roon support to help…
The problem is always worse with local accounts as they can screw up quite spectacularly.

I’ve already tried that Ged. I put an installation of Roon on my wife’s laptop and tried to connect from there. No joy at all.

I did say you might be better off with real support :wink:
Can you copy off the data and format the drive?

That’s what got me here Ged. I rebuilt my system completely last week. Up until then everything worked but since the format and rebuild I’ve had this issue. Thanks for trying though.

Hello @Alan_McMillan,

I have gone ahead and enabled diagnostics mode for your account and what this action will do is next time your Windows Machine is active, a log report will automatically be generated and uploaded to our servers for further analysis. Please keep the machine online with Roon open and connected to the internet. After receiving the log report, I’ll get this case over to QA to take a look at what could be going on here, I will be sure to keep you posted on their findings.

Thanks,
Noris

Done @Noris. Hopefully you come up with something because I’m stumped.

Alan

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Hello @Alan_McMillan,

I have discussed your case with the team and have reviewed the diagnostics. They have a few suggestions:

  • Can you please create a new user in Windows, give that user read/write permissions to the shared folder and then add that folder in Roon using the login credentials for the new user as a network share?

  • Does writing the backup to your Windows Remote Local drive work properly? As in instead of using that external drive, do you still experience this same issue when writing to the C: drive?

Please let me know your findings when possible.

Thanks,
Noris

Hi @noris I tried the new user idea yesterday after @Ged_Hickman suggested it:

I’ve just created a new user with admin rights and the error issue when pointing Roon at the backup folder was the same as before. I’ve even given the everyone group full control over the folder’s read and right access and that STILL wasn’t enough to give Roon authority to access the thing!

As you can see, it didn’t change anything. The other backup I have goes to the QNAP server and it’s fine. I tried creating a share on the C drive per your suggestion and Roon couldn’t gain authority to access that either. As far as backups are concerned, the Windows machine is completely closed off to Roon for some reason.

On the Roon icon, try “right click on the icon - Run as administrator”

–MD

Hi @MikeD
I tried it and it didn’t work. What I don’t understand is that the share connects to the extent that I can see all the folders on the drive but when it comes to running the backup, it doesn’t have the authority to access the RoonBackups folder.

Check these settings.

If you make a change, then log out and then back in.

–MD