How to Access Mac Files from Windows 7
If you have both Mac and PC at home or Office and i am sure you want to either access Mac files form PC or access PC files from Mac. In this guide you will see how to share Mac files for Windows using Mac OS X Snow leopard and Windows 7. This process is simple and easy but first you need to setup your Mac to share files / folder with windows by enabling file sharing option.
This guide is created using Mac OS X Snow leopard and Windows 7. See also File sharing Mac OS X Lion and Windows 7
Step-1
Make sure both computers Mac and PC are connected to the same network Either Wireless or Cable.
Step-2
Right click on desktop and create a “New Folder”, put your all stuff in it that you want to share with Windows 7 (Instead of desktop you can create this folder some other place as you want).
Step-3
Click on “System Preferences…” option under “Apple” menu.
Step-4
Click on “Sharing” icon under “Internet & Wireless” section.
Step-5
Enable file sharing on Mac:
- Note down the IP address of you Mac computer.
- Check the “File Sharing” check box on the left side.
- Click on “+” sign to add share folder that we have created in step-2.
Select folder form “Desktop” and hit “Add” button.
Step-6
Add a new user:
- Shared folder is added, now Hit the “+” sign to add a user as show below. You will use this user to log in from Windows while accessing Mac.
Hit the “New Person” button.
Enter User Name and Password and hit “Create Account” button.
Select User Name that you have added and hit “Select” button.
Step-7
Final Step on Mac:
- You can see the Windows user is listed under “User” section (You can manage user rights by clicking on “Arrows” in front of user name).
- Now do the final step on Mac, Click the “Options” button
Sharing options
- Make sure the following check boxes are checked “Share files and folders using AFP” and “Share files and folders using SMB (Windows)”.
- Also check the Windows user name check box that you have added in step-6 this will prompt to enter password,
Enter the user’s password that you entered while creating new user in step-6 and hit “OK” and then “Done” button.
Step-8
Now Windows Part:
In Windows 7 Press Windows + R keys from keyboard to open Run Window, and type the Mac computer IP address as shown below. You have noted Mac IP address in step-5.
You will see a login Window, Enter the User Name and Password that we have created in Step-6.
Finally you can see the folder in Windows 7 that you have shared on Mac.
This took lot of time to write, you should give some comments below and feel free to ask anything.
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Tags: Mac, Mac OS X, Network, Networking, PC, Share Files, Sharing, Snow Leopard, Windows, Windows 7
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Precise and accurate set of steps to access Mac from Windows. I try it by myself works perfect.
I also accessed Mac data from Windows 7 with this provided guide
Most concise, accurate article on subject I have read. Thank you.
I have Mac OS-X 10.6.4 on an iMac and Win7 Home Premium on a HP Laptop.
Worked fine until step 8 after doing the run command. Instead of a Windows Security window, the Windows Explorer came up with the MAC directories. No chance to “Remember My Credentials”. Thus after putting my HP laptop into sleep and reactivating it, the iMac computer did not show up in the Network directory of Explorer and I had to redo step 8.
On caveat in showing Win7 on the iMac. I had to disable my Norton Smart Firewall and later change the “Trusted Status” in Norton for the network connection.
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Excellent many thanks, I have only had my Mac for 4 days and so this has been a huge help connecting to my existing windows PCs. Thanks for taking the time to educate others.
Great guide, I followed it and successfully got access to Windows 7 computer through Mac.
I just got a windows 7 laptop…want to interact with my iMac. Windows won’t accept/acknowledge mac ip address. Verified it was correct multiple times. Suggestions?
Make sure both computers are on the same Network
Hey guys, i followed everything step by step but when i reached step 8 it doesn’t work, it says cannot access IP…
we are on the same network, same subnet. both firewalls are turned off.
any thoughts? appreciate the help!
Same issue here – followed all the steps bit after entering the IP address of the Mac, the Win 7 machine seems to be doing nothing and faster a minute or so I get a “Windows cannot access \\xxx.xxx.x.xxx”
May Mac can’t see my windows machine either, even though I have network discovery on and firewalls off on both machines. Both machines are on the same home wireless network.
This was immensely helpful! We just bought new PC laptops for our small office that needed to coordinate with a Mac computer, which contains all of our central documents. Your steps were perfectly accurate and easy to follow! Our office is very grateful for this article… Mainly because it kept me from throwing the pretty new PC across the room in frustration!
I do want to throw the windows laptop accross the room!!! I have tried everything I can think of. I can see the mac in the network page of windows 7 but when I try to access it I get a login failure and am asked to login again.
Thanks, this helped a lot! I did this with 0S 10.5 and Windows 7 Home Premium.
2 things I had to do here additionally:
1. it was not enough to just add a simple person for the new connection – I had to add a “standard” account in the accounts panel (otherwise I couldn’t select this account for Samba-Sharing).
2. I had to re-login on Windows 7 – the shared folders weren’t refreshed before.