Encrypted and password-protected folder on Windows 10

Question

I want to have a personal folder on my office desktop secured by a password. What is the most reliable and convenient option?

I found these two:

• Having a 7z archive with encrypted file names. But an archive format is not very convenient.

• Having a VeraCrypt file I can mount as a drive. It seems a good option. I guess I can't use the automount feature because that means if an administrator change my password and log on with my profile he will have the drive automatically mounted and thus access to my files. It seems good but I have to unmount my drive each time I leave my computer.
  Is it a bad idea to synchronize a Google Drive folder in that virtual drive?

Is there a better solution?

Ideally I would like to have an encrypted folder asking for a password each time I open it and that stays unlocked for a short period of time (30 minutes).

Answer 1

Windows 10 Pro has EFS built in, you can encrypt a file or folder and contents.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0pN0rN8MEM

Answer 2

The best way is to just use the built-in features of Windows. As in Moab's answer EFS is a good starting point that keeps all files ancrypted. It relies on the Windows account's password as the encryption key together with a certificate that you should backup just in case. That fullfils the encryption requirement.

As for the password, just putting a password on the Windows account will suffice to prevent access to unauthorized people, as Windows (or any other system for the matter) won't be able to decrypt it without the password. Closing session makes the files inaccesible again. A screen saver with a timeout that triggers the lock screen afterward also blocks the computer automatically after a period, so it requires the password again.