Default location on partitioned hard disk?

Marty999

anewhope wrote: »

You need to go into the Registry to modify the default installation path by navigating through to the following:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version

And then then changing the value of ProgramFilesDir from C:\Program Files to E:\Program Files

Before you make any changes to it, make sure you highlight it and click File then Save In. Chose a location that is easy to access, like the desktop. It will save a .reg file so in the event of anything going wrong, you can just double click that to change the value back to what it was previously.

I have made this change as suggested. The funny thing is that I didn't get the option to File/Save In though, and I couldn't find the Windows backup utility so I took another image of Windows installation with Acronis.

Thanks for your help.

andy2004

as kwik said, if you install onto another partition, and then use an old recovery as the new recovery got infected, ie the infection was already there and you used an older image, the older image may not have the newly installed programs on there, so when you go to use those programs because the registry in the old backup is missing the required information, they wont work and then you will have to reinstall those apps again. it is better just to leave the install folder where it is and create a backup of the proper C drive.
Saying that. I would put all your downloads, files you created, music you ripped from the cd you own onto another partition where they would be safe, This would keep the size down. with acronis it has about the same compression as the old ZIP format so your looking at around 50% compression average, my personal windows used is 10gb and i get a filesize of around 4gb. partition is around 20gb. I never put any installed apps anywhere but c:\program files\ as i got fed up creating new shortcuts and reinstalling apps where they where installed on d: or e: and now no longer worked and had to be reinstalled.
I use acronis, i always do a full backup, never a update of the previous image. just in case i delete the wrong file. then you would have to reinstall every thing from scratch.

robt_2

To be honest I don't think doing what you are doing is good advice at all.

Having two partitions is good - but have one for Windows and your programs and the other for your data/files.

kwikbreaks

One time I've found it worthwhile installing a program somewhere other than c:\program files is with Vista.

Vista is paranoid about c:\program files and insists on run as admin being used to copy stuff in and out plus it squirrels any program produced data aimed there into a "virtual" location on a huge long path which I always forget. This is fine for most programs but I have some where I need to modify data within the program dir (one is a web page template which the program uses to upload data to the internet and I sometimes need to change). Installing those programs in their own directory circumvents all the really annoying "Bill knows best" nanny state crud imposed by Vista. I still leave them in the windows partition though.

Marty999

Thanks for your input folks, it looks like I have been following some following some questionable advice then. I'll change the program installation default back to C:\ and when I get Windows 7 I'll create a separate partition and just that for data only.