Mount Remote CIFS/SMB Share as a Folder not a Drive Letter

Question

Is there any way to mount a remote CIFS/SMB/SAMBA share as a folder/directory and not as a drive letter. For example, I want this map:

\\Server\ShareName -> C:\Folder\ShareName

Instead of the usual map like this:

\\Server\ShareName -> Z:\

The server is Linux/Samba and the client is Windows 7 Professional 64-bit. The closest I've found is being able to mount a local volume as a subfolder using the Windows disk manager, but it doesn't appear to handle remote CIFS shares (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307889).

Answer 1

Just to map a network share directory you would use this command:

net use \\Server\ShareName\Directory

This mapping would not be persistent and would have to be established and authenticated at user login, and you would access the share using the UNC path and not a local drive letter.

If you want to access the network share through a location on your local C: drive. You'll want to set up a symbolic link:

mklink /d  C:\Folder\ShareName \\Server\ShareName\Directory

Now when you navigate to C:\Folder\Share you're see the contents of \\Server\Sharename\Directory. You'll still need to provide authentication for the resource with something like net use (or just be logged into a domain account on a domain system that has access) otherwise the link will probably error out angrily.

Answer 2

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/mountvol.mspx?mfr=true

From the horses mouth:

If you are running out of drive letters to use, mount your local volumes with no drive letters.

Answer 3

Click "Start", then click Computer. You're now in 'My Computer/Explorer'.
Right-click Computer, and click "Add a network location"
Then enter the server and share you would like to connect to

\\[servername]\[sharename]