Copy a file to all computers in LAN network with Windows CMD

Solution 1:

A good starting point in CMD is something like:

xcopy "c:\path\to\file" "\\computername\C$\users\username\appdata\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\"

Or the same thing in Powershell:

Copy-Item "c:\path\to\file" "\\$Computername\C$\users\$username\appdata\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\"

There are certainly ways to loop through a list of users/computers, but it depends on how you plan to define and/or get those lists. You could scan the whole local network for example, but it would be extremely slow. There are also a lot of things on the network to consider like firewall settings or whether the PCs are in a windows domain.

To check access, try browsing to the remote PC by pasting the UNC path into file explorer: \\computername\C$\. If it prompts you for credentials, you will need to provide them as part of your command as well.

For computers not in a windows domain, you usually need to log in with the username formatted like RemotePCName\Username. If you are able to log in using windows explorer, then you can try doing the same with Powershell:

# This will prompt you for login credentials
$Credential = Get-Credential

# connect to the remote PC as a specific user
New-PSDrive -Name RemotePC -PSProvider FileSystem -Root \\RemotePC\C$ -Credential $Credential

# Now copy the file using the connection:
Copy-Item "c:\path\to\file" "RemotePC:\users\$username\appdata\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\"