How to Login to a Shared Network Drive
By Jeff Grundy
If you have several computers in your home, Windows 7 makes it easy to share files and folders in a home network. Although previous versions of Windows allowed you to create a local area network, Windows 7 makes granting access to your shared files and folders as simple as a few mouse clicks. After you have created a home network, other people in your home can access, copy and even open the files in your shared folders. Connecting to a shared folder over the network is a task almost anyone can accomplish.
Right-click on the Windows "Start" button and then click "Open Windows Explorer" on the pop-up list.
Scroll to and click the "Network" link in the left side of the window. Wait for Windows to load the local network information and create a list of computers on the home network.
Click on the icon for the network computer that has the shared folder you want to access.
Browse to the shared folder and click its name to open it. Enter a user name and password if prompted to do so and press the "Enter" key. In most cases, you are not required to enter a user name and password to login to a shared folder. However, a user can choose to limit access to certain shared folders, thus creating the need to enter a user name and password.
References
Tips
- You can create a drive letter and permanent connection to the shared folder on the other computer by clicking the "Map network drive" button in "Computer" and following the on-screen prompts.
Warnings
- You can only access on a shared network drive if the other computer is on and logged into Windows.
Writer Bio
Jeff Grundy has been writing computer-related articles and tutorials since 1995. Since that time, Grundy has written many guides to using various applications that are published on numerous how-to and tutorial sites. Born and raised in South Georgia, Grundy holds a Master of Science degree in mathematics from the Georgia Institute of Technology.