Re: Local Disc (F:)

Tech-Archive recommends: Repair Windows Errors & Optimize Windows Performance

On Sat, 2 Feb 2008 09:51:16 -0500, "Anna" <myname@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Over the years in a Windows environment we've encountered many problems and
annoyances with users' machines where their system (boot) drive had not been
designated with the ubiquitous C: drive assignment letter because of one
reason or another, chiefly because another (potentially) bootable storage
device had been connected in the system while the user was attempting to
fresh-install the XP OS. (I believe this is the root of the OP's problem.)


Yes, that's almost certainly the reason.


Also, problems arising from faulty processes involving a disk cloning
operation.

In any event, the problems we subsequently encountered because of this
situation involved the inability (present & future) for the user to install
a particular program on his/her system (boot) drive because the program
simply balked at any attempt to install such program other than on a C:
designated drive. True, virtually any major program in existence today will
allow this capability but there are still a host of programs out there
(including "custom-made" programs) that simply don't have this capability.


As I said in my earlier message in this thread, yes, there are some
older programs that insist on installing on C: and simply won't work
otherwise. But my experience is that such programs are *extremely*
rare these days. In several years of running with both Windows XP and
Windows Vista installed on drive F:, with a wide variety of different
programs, I haven't run into a single one.

My recommendation to the OP is that, unless he knows that he is in a
situation where he has to install a program that won't install on F:,
he ignore this possibility. If he doesn't already have such a program,
it is *extremely* unlikely that any new program he buys will have such
a restriction.


We also encountered problems where future user configuration modifications
simply wouldn't work because the program had originally been installed on a
non-C: designated drive.


Can you be more specific? What modifications? I've never run into such
a problem.


Also, we've run into many problems with subsequent upgrades, patches, fixes
of one sort or another affecting an installed program that either would not
modify the targeted program because the program resided on an other-than-C:
drive (even though the user had not originally experienced any difficulty in
installing that program on a non-C: drive), or even if the upgrade, patch,
etc. appeared to be installed properly we ran into subsequent problems of
one kind or another which we attributed to the fact that the program resided
on a non-C: designated drive.


Again, please be more specific. I have never run into such a problem
in several years on my own computer (again running both XP and Vista),
nor on any other computers, nor have I ever heard of such a problem
from anyone else.


So all-in-all as I've suggested to the OP, if it's not too terribly onerous
to "start over" as it were and perform a correct fresh install of the XP OS
so as to install that OS on a C: designated drive, our advice is do so.


Unless it's a very recent installation, with very little on the drive,
reinstalling cleanly *is* usually onerous, and often gets the person
into even more difficulties. My advice to him is contrary to yours. Do
not do this unless you need to because you are trying to install some
program that refuses to install on F:. I doubt very much that he is in
that situation and simply needs to change the drive letter from the
default that is presented to him.


--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
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