There are cloud services to store files securely online, so that they can be synchronized between the various computers. Among these two most popular dies are certainly OneDrive from Microsoft and Google Drive.
They are among the most used not only because of Microsoft and Google, not only because one is integrated in Windows and Windows Phone and the other is integrated in Android, but also because they are generous, with a rather large free space, starting from 15 GB .
Like all cloud services, these two are also linked to a management program that must be installed on all proprietary computers.
The program synchronizes the files, allows you to use them and add them by creating a new folder on the PC.
If, however, you want to have direct access to Onedrive or Google Drive, without using the program, you can use the network folder from Windows .
Mapping Microsoft Onedrive as a network drive on Windows allows you to manage your files as you would any other file on the main disk.
READ ALSO: How to use Dropbox Google Drive or Onedrive as a PC partition disk
Add Onedrive as a network folder in Windows
First of all, you need to open the Onedrive web page and log in to your Microsoft account.
You must then click on the page on File at the top left and make the copy link address .
Open a new text document on Windows and paste the copied link.
The link address will look something like this //onedrive.live.com/#cid=365b486467d701c .
The part to the right of the cid is practically the account ID.
To map Onedrive as a network drive, simply use the link //d.docs.live.net/, adding the account id.
It therefore becomes, in this example, //d.docs.live.net/365b486467d701c .
Alternatively, try \\ \ 365b486467d701c
Now open a Windows window, right click on Network in the tree on the left and then on the option Connect network drive.
The same option is found by clicking on the computer disk, from the ribbon menu at the top.
In the window that opens, assign a letter to the unit and paste the link where you are asked to specify the server address.
Windows will attempt to connect to the specified network drive and ask for a username and password to log in.
On your PC you can select the option to remember your credentials so that you no longer have to enter your password.
After authentication, the Microsoft Onedrive archive should be visible as if it were a computer disk.
The same procedure can be done even shorter is possible by opening a dos prompt and writing the command
net use y: //d.docs.live.net/xxxxxxxxxxxx
To delete a mapped drive, the command is instead
net use y: / delete
If there were problems and Windows said it was impossible to add or connect to the network drive, the Webdav service may have been disabled.
To enable webdav in Windows 8 and Windows 10 go to services (press the Windows-R keys and write services.msc) and activate the Webclient service or restart it by setting it automatic.
Then open the registry key editor with the regedit command (always from the box that appears by pressing the Windows-R keys), open the folders on the tree on the left with the following path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE / SYSTEM / CurrentControlSet / Services / WebClient / Parameters and on the right change the BasicAuthLevel value putting as number 2 instead of 1.
Try again.
Adding Google Drive, Dropbox or other cloud services like network disks in Windows is not so simple and you need to use an external program like Netdrive, which is not free, but you can try it for thirty days.
Microsoft Onedrive is the only one that gives you the ability to map network drives without having to download any additional software.
READ ALSO: Synchronize any online folder in the Clouds with symbolic links
