Tag: Windows 10 Mobile

Give your Windows 10 Mobile smartphone a unique name

Article

Nokia Lumia 950 press image courtesy of Microsoft

Nokia Lumia 950 – representative of Windows 10 Mobile – you can give it a distinct name

How to rename your Windows 10 Mobile handset | Windows Central

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Most desktop and mobile operating systems allow you to name your computing device so it is logically identifiable from others of the same platform.

This is important with identifying devices that are or to be connected on a Wi-Fi or Bluetooth network or dealing with applications and games that only identify participants by device name. It is also about managing your devices’ access to cloud services including social networks

This was available on Windows Phone but was so well hidden that most Windows Phone users didn’t know it existed. It is because, unlike other operating systems, Windows Phone didn’t ask you to name your device as part of the setup process.

But there are two ways to go about this.

Using your Windows Phone’s control surface

To change:

  1. Tap Start then All Apps, then tap Settings
  2. Tap on System
  3. Tap About, which brings up details about your device
  4. Tap “Edit Name” which allows you to change your device’s name
  5. Enter your phone’s new name in Device Name field and tap Save

To verify

  1. Tap Start then All Apps then tap Settings
  2. Tap on System
  3. Tap About which brings up details about your device including its new name

Your Windows phone tethered to your Windows computer

Prerequisites: USB data transfer cable that suits your Windows Phone and regular Windows computer

This process is similar to giving removeable storage like a USB memory key, SD card or optical disk a volume name which identifies it.

To change

  1. Connect your Windows Phone to computer using a USB data transfer cable and let Windows detect the phone.
  2. Open File Explorer (Windows Explorer)
  3. Discover your phone under Devices and Drives. This is alongside your computer’s hard disk and other storage devices connected directly to your computer and your phone’s icon should be there.
  4. Right-click your phone’s icon and select Rename
  5. Rename as if you are renaming a USB memory key, then press Enter

To verify

Disconnect and reconnect the Windows phone to verify the change is applied and double check in File Explorer