Moving from C: to D:

[Supercharts]

My C: Drive is very low on space. My D: drive has a good amount of free space.

How can I move an application plus all of it's associated files from the C: Drive to the D: Drive without re-installing? And updating the registry when I do it?

Is there a utility built into the OS or is there a utility elsewhere that will do this?

I have Windows XP Pro.

 

[elevatedsteve]

Some applications will work if you just move them. In this case you may have to redirect the shortcut in your start menu (or any other shortcut you have) but the program will work without being re-installed. However, there are plenty that can't handle the move.

There is one trick I know of that you can do if conditions are right.
For instance, if you want to move everything in c:\Program Files to the d: drive:

first copy all the directories in c:\program files to the d: drive
they will have to be at the root level, not in d:\program files

you will have:
c:\program files\ with nothing in it
d:\app1
d:\app2
d:\app3
...

go to Control Panels->Administrative Tools->Computer Managment.

on the left menu choose Disk Management

you should see a list of your partitions (one will be the c: drive and one will be the d: drive)
click on the d: drive partition and right click->change drive letters and paths...

a box should pop up that shows D:

choose add...
choose Mount in the following empty NTFS folder.
type in c:\program files and choose ok

now c:\program files should work exactly like d:\

all registry entries that point to c:\program files\app1\ now are exactly the same as d:\app1

I think there might be a way to mount a directory on d: to a directory on c: (as opposed to a partion to a directory) but I don't know how to off the top of my head.


hope this helps

Steven

 

[Phillybee]

Are we talking about one physical drive with multiple partitions or multiple drives?

 

[Wudang]

System mechanic is supposed to be able to do that.

 

[richardm]

Last time I needed to do that, I just moved the files then ran Registry First Aid to update the necessary bits in the registry. It worked fine.

Steve's technique sounds interesting, though.

 

[DavoMan]

Whos idea was it for software to rely on the registy? Lets fire him.

 

[hodgy]

Well - given that there's usually a wizard, I'd just reinstall - easy and risk-free usually.