D-Link DNS323 (DNS 323)

Disclaimer: These pages are provided 'as is' without any liability or any kind, if you decide to follow these steps it is your responsibility.

Mapping a network drive on a D-Link DNS323

Why would you want to 'map' a drive on your DNS-323 ?

If you open 'My Computer' then you will probably see something like this . . . .

All that can by seen are the 'standard' places that you would expect, your local hard disc, optical drive and a couple of folders. What would be useful if for the networked drives in the DNS323 to show up just like the C: drive that is in your computer.

Getting MS Windows to recognise that drive and show it is referred to as "drive mapping" because it tells the operating system to map a different drive letter to somewhere else.

As with most computer things there are a number of ways to achieve the same result, we can use the D-link Easy Search Utility, or we can do the job manually.

The Easy Search Utility is really much easier to use, so we'll look at that first.

 

Begin by opening the application, it may be on the CD that came with your DNS323, but it's quite likely that you will have downloaded a more up-to-date version from the D-link support site.

If that's the case then the icon looks like this. This shows version 3.4.0.0.

If you don't see the d-link dns323 click the Refresh button at the top right-hand side of the window. Here I've clicked on the name in the top part of the window to select the dns323.

You can see that the two available drives are shown in the bottom window and the other details in the middle.

How do decide which drive letter to map your DNS323 onto

This doesn't sound too difficult, the Easy Search utility shows you which drives are available so you have a lot to choose from. However, there are some things to bear in mind before you select. Once you have mapped the drive it will re-appear next time you boot up your system. If you have other things that you regularly connect then you might already be comfortable with the drive allocations that you get.

For example - I have a USB pen drive on which I keep certain things that I don't want to leave on my hard disc, that stays plugged into the side of my monitor most of the time and gets allocated to drive E: Then there is my external hard disc in a box where I store all my digital photos that usually sits on drive F: and finally my digital camera that gets drive G: usually. Bearing that in mind I don't want to select a drive for mapping to that will be any lower in the alphabet than H:

In fact I decided to pick Z and V - that was a purely arbitrary choice, I just liked those letters for my drives.

Mapping a drive on the D-Link DNS-323

Three things to do . . .

Click the drive name that you want to use

Select the drive letter that you want your computer to use

Click the Connect button

That should send the Easy Search utility off to set up the drive mapping.

You will need to enter your username and password next, then the mapping should be confirmed.

You should see a message saying "Successfully mapped drive".

Look in the main Easy Search utility window just below the message and you should see the drive letter that you selected shown as the location of the drive.

If you have got it wrong, you can 'un-map the drive by clicking on it's name, then instead of clicking the Connect button, click Disconnect. Then repeat the mapping with the correct letter.

Return to 'My Computer' and you should see the new networked drive icon with its drive letter.