If you try to connect to a share on a file server you already have connections or mapped drives to, using alternate credentials, Windows displays: The network folder specified is currently mapped using a different user name and password. To connect using a different user name and password, first disconnect any existing mappings to this network share. It is sometimes possible to bypass this by: - create a DNS alias (if you have access to DNS), pointing a different name to the file server or - create an entry in the hosts file, pointing to the IP address of the file server but with a different hostname that you make up Then, connect to the desired share using the net use command from a cmd window: net use r: \\altnamefileserver\e$ /user:domain_admin@examplewindowsdomain.com