Mapping Network Drives

Mapping means attaching to a shared folder from another machine so it appears to be a new drive letter on the local machine. This is used, for example, to point to the source folder for installation files. Any machine accessing that folder could copy the required files to complete the installation.

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This submenu can be accessed by right-clicking on the My Computer icon or the My Network Places icon:

A drive letter is suggested by the wizard, but others are available.

The UNC path may be typed in directly, or the path may be browsed.

The share is accessed using a UNC path of the form \\server\share  – in this case the shared folder “Tony” on the computer “10.0.0.1”.

The shared folder “Tony” now appears as just another drive on the local machine.

You can also map a drive by using a command line. The command is the form of net use <driveletter> \\server\share.

e.g. net use z: \\10.0.0.1\public would automatically map drive Z to the share public share located on 10.0.0.1