How to mount a hard drive as a folder in windows 10

Today we bring you the tutorial of how to mount a hard disk drive as a folder in Windows 10 in an easy and intuitive way. And it is that as soon as the computer begins to run out of space, usually a new hard drive is usually installed, and so you are ready again to continue loading files. However, as time passes, too many units will be displayed on your computer, this not being the best option for your team.

How to Mount a Hard Drive as a Folder in Windows 10

Instead of using RAID (redundant array of inexpensive disks), or any other method to group logical drives, you can also use a feature found in Windows 10 (and earlier versions), which allows you to assign a mount point to a hard drive to appear as a folder on your computer instead of using a drive letter.

With Windows, you can easily assign a drive letter to a folder in order to create a logical drive. The folder will be considered by Windows and applications as a physical drive. There can be many reasons why you decide to mount a folder as a drive:

• It is another way (of the many that exist) to access a folder quickly. Some applications may require access to a specific drive, and mounting a folder as a disk can deceive them. By creating a batch file it will be easier to reference the folder and make changes later as well. Create shorter accesses based on directory name.

In this guide we are going to use the Disk Management tool to assign a mount point to a hard disk connected to your computer.

How to Mount a Hard Drive as a Folder in Windows 10

- Use Windows + E keyboard shortcut keys to open File Explorer.

- Go to a folder location where you want to create the mount points and create a folder with a descriptive name. For example, "ProfessionalReview".

- Double click on the newly created folder and create a folder for each hard drive you want to mount with a descriptive name. For example, Disc1 and Disc2.

- Use Windows + X key combination to open the submenu of the Start button and select Disk Management.

- Click on the empty space of the new unit to be mounted as a folder and select New Simple Volume.

- Click Next.

- Click Next again.

- Select the option "Mount in the following empty NTFS folder" and click on Browse.

- Select the folder you want to assign as a mount point. For example, C: \ ProfessionalReview \ Disk1.

- Click OK.

- Click Next.

Leave the default options, be sure to change the drive label to a descriptive name, and select "Quick Format."

- Click Next.

- Click Finish to complete the task.

Perhaps one of the best features of this approach is that it is non-destructive, which means that adding or removing a mount point will not erase the data. However, this only works with disks formatted with the NTFS file system.

How to mount a hard drive that contains data as a folder in Windows 10

If the disk already contains data, you can use the following steps in Disk Management to remove the drive letter and assign a mount point.

- Click on the drive and select the option "Change the drive letter and paths".

- Click Add.

- Select the option "Mount in the following empty NTFS folder" and click on Browse.

- Select the folder you want to assign the mount point to. For example, C: \ ProfessionalReview \ Disco2.

- Click OK.

- Click OK again to complete the task.

- Click on the same disk drive and select "Change drive letter and paths" again.

- Select the old drive letter and click Remove.

- Click Yes to confirm the removal of drive letters.

Remember that you can use the same steps mentioned above to remove the mount point and go back to the drive letter.

This configuration of a mount point is not only helpful in reducing the number of drive letters on your computer, but will also help you organize your drives more efficiently.

This solution is also ideal when sharing a folder on the network, and you're running out of space. Instead of creating a new network share, you can mount a drive as a folder within the shared folder on the network.

It is important to note that each hard drive will continue to work independently, which means that if one drive fails, the files on the others are not lost. However, it is always recommended to perform a full backup before modifying anything on your computer.

Manually mount a folder as a virtual drive

In Windows this function can be executed using the Subst command. You will need to create a shortcut in the Windows Startup folder to run this command. To access the Windows Startup folder, you need to go to the following location:

C: \ Users \ \ AppData \ Roaming \ Microsoft \ Windows \ Start Menu \ Programs \ Start

Here the "username" is the login name you use to access Windows 10.

You can also access the folder directly by pasting the aforementioned location in Windows Explorer by replacing "username" with your username.

Once in the start folder, right-click on a blank area and in the context menu, place the mouse cursor over "New". Now, from the side menu that opened, click on "shortcut" and a wizard will open.

In the wizard, a blank field will appear asking you to enter the location of the folder you want to mount as a drive. Here, type the following command:

WE RECOMMEND YOU Nexus 5 blocked and I cannot turn it off

subst X: "Folder location"

You need to replace "Folder Location" with the current folder location you want to mount as a disk drive (along with the quotes) and "X" with the drive letter you want to give the folder. If you don't know the location of the folder path, just go to the folder and copy the mentioned path at the top of the browser.

Paste the folder inside the quotes and click Next. Give the shortcut a name in the next step and click Finish.

Now you need to open the new shortcut to create the virtual drive. You will see a new disk next to all other physical and opening drives to open the specified folder.

The virtual drive is automatically loaded every time the computer is restarted. If you want to delete the drive, you will have to delete the shortcut you have created, and then restart your PC to take effect.

Mount a folder as a virtual disk using an application

The above method works perfectly, but it can be a bit of a tedious task, especially when you have to restart your computer to get rid of the virtual drive. Fortunately, there is an app to do the same that can make the process much easier.

In this tutorial we are going to use the Visual Subst application. It is totally a free tool and does not require any kind of installation.

- Extract the zip file and run the application. In the interface, click on the drop-down menu below and select the drive letter you want to give your virtual disk drive.

- Click on the small magnifying glass icon in the lower right corner of the window and select the folder you want to mount as a unit.

- Check the box below if you want the computer to always mount the specified folder as a drive every time you start the system. Click on the green “+” icon and the folder will be mounted.

- If you want to unmount the folder, select the folder in the interface and click on the red "x" of the unmount icon (no restart required). It will be removed from the interface, and you will have to go through the same process again to add it.

Multiple folders can also be mounted using this tool. You just have to repeat the process and select a new folder every time you mount a virtual drive.

Final words

Using this process you can make your drives appear as folders on another drive. Logically it will look like your drive, but none of the files in that folder will physically be on another drive. It should be noted that this only works with NTFS formatted drives.

Was the tutorial on how to mount a hard drive as a folder in Windows 10 helpful?