Google Drive is well-known for its free apps, ease of use, and integration with Gmail and other Google services. You can also download Google drive for desktop, which would allow your machine to automatically sync your files with Google Drive.
On a PC, here’s how to add Google Drive to your PC.
Use Google Drive for desktop
- With Google Drive for Desktop, you can find and open your files from Google Drive on your computer. You can do the following:
- Offline backups of specified files and folders, including shared drives, are available.
- View and arrange your files in the file system of your computer without taking up any storage space.
Use your PC to open files.
Install and set up Google Drive for desktop
- Remove the old Google Drive folder from your PC using Windows Explorer.
- Log in to your Georgetown Google Apps account if you haven’t already.
- Go to the Google Drive home page in your browser.
- Click Download for Windows on the Google Drive Help page.
- Click Save File in the pop-up box that appears. If you’re prompted to save the installer file, titled googledrivefilestream.exe, to a location, save it to your desktop. (If you aren’t prompted, the file may already be in your Downloads folder.)
- Open Windows Explorer, go to your Downloads folder, and double-click the googledrivefilestream.exe installer file.
- In the security window that appears, select Yes.
- You should see a window with a progress bar showing the installer file’s download status.
- After that, the installation will begin, and you will see the following window:
- Enter your Mac username and password if prompted.
The following installation confirmation box should appear once the installation is complete:
- The “Sign in” window for Google Drive File Stream will also appear.
- Enter your Georgetown email address in the Google Drive “Sign in” window, then click Next. (Note that the email address in the case below is “jh123@georgetown.edu.”)
- Enter your NetID and password in the login window, then click “SIGN IN.” (Note: If you use Duo to authenticate to Georgetown applications, make sure you have your phone handy to confirm the Duo authentication notification.)
- The Google drive pc application will launch, and the following window should appear.
- Click the right-pointing arrow in Google Drive for Desktop until you see “Open Explorer.” (A feature of Google Drive for Desktop is available in each window in which you navigate.) Select “OPEN EXPLORER” from the drop-down menu.
In Google Drive for Desktop, a Windows Explorer window appears, displaying your “My Drive” and “Team Drives” folders.
Drive for desktop allows you to sync content across all your devices.
Every year, more content is created, and more devices are used to access that content. As a result, being able to keep data, folders, and photos safe, synced between devices, backed up, and organized is more important than ever. To address this, we’ll be releasing several new capabilities for Drive for desktop (Windows and macOS), our unified sync client that allows you to seamlessly sync your content across all your devices and the cloud, in the coming weeks.
Sync and access content from your PC or Mac in a flash.
While many individuals access Google Drive via their web browser or mobile apps, some want to have access to their files and photographs immediately on their desktop, exactly like items stored locally on their device. Drive for desktop is a Windows and macOS application that allows you to access material straight from your desktop, allowing you to rapidly access files and folders in a familiar environment. Drive for desktop also syncs local files to the cloud in the background, which cuts down on the amount of time you must wait for files to sync.
You may access files directly from the cloud on your Mac or PC with Drive for desktop, saving disc space and network congestion. Because Drive files are hosted in the cloud, any modifications you or your colleagues make are automatically updated everywhere, ensuring that you always have the most up-to-date version.
All users will benefit from a single, simple-to-use, and speedier sync client.
Before introducing Drive for desktop, we had two sync options: Backup and Sync, which was designed for consumer customers, and Drive File Stream, which was designed for business users. Now, we’re combining both sync clients into the new Drive for desktop, giving people access to the greatest and most-used features from both Backup and Sync and Drive File Stream, such as the ability to:
- Photos and videos can be uploaded and synced to Google Photos and/or Google Drive.
- External storage devices, such as flash drives and external hard drives, can be synced to the cloud.
- Mirror Drive files on your desktop, which saves your files locally and allows you to access them more quickly.
For desktop, I’m switching to Google Drive.
Users of Backup and Sync will begin to see reminders in the coming weeks encouraging them to migrate to Drive for desktop, which we recommend doing by September 2021. Users will receive an in-product notification after this point informing them that they must transition to continue synchronising their files. Please see this Help Centre article for more information on the switch from Backup and Sync to Drive for desktop.
