"The operation can't be completed because the original item for...can't be found."

"I have an external drive connected to my PC that is FULLY SHARED according to Windows to the best of my knowledge."

Windows 8 does anybody know what's going on? Instead of knocking yourself out with the Mac consider it's a Windows issue.

I'm having the same issue. Windows 8 Pro x64 with a fully shared USB hard drive.

I get,

The operation can't be completed because the original item for " " can't be found.

whenever i try t access the drive from My mountain Lion Macbook Air, yet I can get to the Users folder that i shared fine.

I've read this has been problem since Lion, anyone figured out a fix, or a third party app that will help get around this?

Yeah this problem is still in Lion. I can't even connect my Lion machine to another Mac. Let alone Windows. But the Windows and Mac will connect to the Lion machine.

I'm having the exact same problem, except that my PC is running Vista. I have a brand new MBP. I can access the "User" folder just fine, but not the other folders that I am sharing. Anyone find a fix for this yet?

The problem's not just with Lion. I'm getting the error message with 10.6.8 as I try to access Windows 7 .

I can access the other machine's other internal and external hard drives, though.

Instead of trying to Share the whole C: drive (thinking it's protecting itself from access to System files), I've targeted specific directories on the C: drive for Sharing.

These sub-directories are listed, on the Mac, but when I click on the Directory names, that's when I get the error message that led me to this thread. "The original item for [directory] can't be found".

I am having the same exact issue and I've been busting my testi-balls to figure it out. I've got 15 years experience in the computer game and still can't figure it out. I see a lot of people having similiar issues, but no one seems to have an answer for MY issue, which is virtually the same as the OP.

Brand new Macbook Retina.

Windows 7 x64 Machine.

ALL drives shared with ALL permissions of ALL accounts manually inserted on the Windows 7 side.

ALL other PC's in the house can access the drives on the Windows 7 machine without issue.

Only the Macbook Retina has the problem connecting. Every Windows drive I shared is visible under "network" in finder, but when I click on any of them it gives the quoted error message the OP stated.

PLEASE, if anyone finds a fix for this, let us know!

I did find something...

I noticed that on the Mac, at the top of the window which listed the contents of the Shared Computer, was the line "Connected as: Guest" .

In Windows 7, I right-clicked a folder, clicked-on "Specific People", then in the next window to appear I used the drop-down menu to select "Guest".

I clicked "Add" and "Guest" appeared on the lower list.

I then gave "Guest" Read/Write privileges.

Now on the Mac I was able to access that folder.

I've tested it with several folders since then; all are accessible now.

Good luck.

I tried that as well and it made no difference.

HOWEVER, I JUST FIXED THIS. I was about to give up and I tried one last thing.

There are two workgroups in my house.... both obviously with a different name. Mine was simply called "WORKGROUP". Now, "workgroup" was exactly what was designated on both my Windows 7 machine and my Macbook. THIS WAS THE ISSUE. I don't know why, but perhaps the separate network I've got going on down here has an issue. I needed to join the other workgroup in my home. I don't know if it helps anyone, but this other workgroup was named specifically in my DLINK router under "Local Domain Name". As soon as I joined both my Macbook and WIndows 7 machine to the other workgroup, I could mount my Windows 7 drive in Mountain Lion immediately without any issues.

Good luck!

I had a folder that was shared, on a D drive connected to my mother inside the PC using win 8.

I had an external Raid drive connected via USB 3.0 to the PC

The drive D folders were shared, while the external was not.

I couldnt get mine to work even I tried everything, including adding ''everyone" and "Guests" to the security and sharing tab.

Finally I gave up using USB 3.0, and plug in the esata instead on the raid drive and it worked, since the raid drive has both.

Breathless19's solution worked for me. Unbelievable! Is there a chance that this is a correct behaviour according to Samba's specifications, and that Apple takes it too strict and others (linux / win) are less stringent?

OldFangle's suggestion did the trick for me in similar circs..

I was able to clear this error when I cleared some space on my full mac hard-drive.

I had this problem as well. I shared all my hard drives on PC, Then I found in Windows in sharing, there is an option to click weather to have Windows manage remote logins or to use a user name and password. I clicked login with user/password. Then my workgroup closed. Went back to my mac and changed from connect as guest to connect as :then used the login for my windows 8.1 and it worked. No my problem is I open the folder just fine but see NOTHING. I dont get it!

OK I have 6 drives on my PC and i finally clicked on USERS and that one showed me the folders in it. But none of the other drives show anything. Also, Yesterday I uploaded mu music from my PC to the Windows Skydrive. All uploaded fine as I have a quick internet connection. Then went to my Mac to download same music. The folders were in the skydrive but no music in the folders. Went back to the PC and the music is there. Whats up with that?

I am not sure if anyone is still having this problem. If you are try this fix, it worked for me (after searching for a solution for about 6 hours!!)

- right click on the folder/drive you want to share in windows

- go to 'properties'

- click the 'security' tab.

- See if 'Guest' is listed under the names.

- If not click on 'edit'

- click 'add'

- in the 'enter the object names to select' box at the bottom type 'guest'

- click 'check names'

- this should then bring up the path name of your user (in this case guest) i.e COMPUTERNAME\GUEST

- click ok

- select 'guest'

- select which permission you want to allow 'guest' to have on the file

and wallah, you should be set to go.

note: this should do it even if some of your share paths are in uppercase and others in lowercase which was what I thought was the problem.

good luck with it!

I set up my forum account just to thank you! This solved the operation error I was getting and I'm super grateful! Thanks for being awesome 🙂