widowmate - November 18, 2009

Windows is your OS? I thought so. Windows has a rather inflexible file system that REQUIRES drive C: be the location of the operating system – and by default puts everything else there too.

Meanwhile Linux will quite happily reside wherever you want it to – even leaving Windows to its own quirks. See http://www. ehow. com/how_2147183_add-linux-windows-computer. html – but back to your OS.

It is NOT possible to simply move the directory “Program Files” to another drive. So what to do?

No matter where you install your applications, part of the information has to go on C:, no way around it. For example, C:Windows will hold parts of most programs, and C: will hold the program’s setup and other information in Registry entries – mostly on C:

If you add another hard drive and tell a program – at install time – to install itself there, it will in large part. This is true for Photoshop (but try Gimp, it’s FREE and better) and for AIM. That will free up some of C:. But you have to do it correctly. Here’s how.

To do so, install the new hard drive. Crank up Windows and use File Manager to see what letter it gets assigned. Say it is given the letter X [though E: is more likely]. Then gather all your program installation disks. Use Add/Remove Programs to Remove the program. Then reinstall it again using that installation program’s options to put itself on drive X:. The option will specify the default C, and the easiest way to change things so they aren’t confused is to edit ONLY the one letter [change only the C to X] and leave all else alone.

If no alternate to C: is offered, the program can’t be installed elsewhere.

Repeat for every application. Remember to tell each program to also put its DATA elsewhere [X: in our example].

What happens if you then unplug the portable drive? That’s perhaps why part of the program goes on C: anyway – the system will politely tell you that your program isn’t there. But a not so polite complication happens if you plug in a memory stick and it gets the drive letter Windows expects. In that case even plugging your drive in won’t let the programs be found – it has to be assigned the same letter. I’ve even had portable drive users that installed programs expecting different letters – on the same drive. Gumballs up real fast.

Glad I had no part in designing Windows. Obviously Windows was designed with new technology such as this and the Internet – not to mention security – being of no concern. As Bill Gates famously said, “Nobody needs more than 640K. ” Soon after that, Linus Torvalds invented Linux.

Good luck!