WinXP help required you clever people.

[Guest ferret]

I've build a computer for my girlfriend as a christmas present. All's well apart from this tiny little problem. It's just really annoying me at the moment.

What I want is for the little folders to appear when you're exploring folders etc. I've looked through all the options but can't find anything relevant.

PS, problem number 2!!! At the moment I've got

floppy - A:

Hard Drive - E:

CD Reader - F:

CD RW - D:

Can I change these to A:, C:, D:, E: if so how? :roll:

Thanks :lol:

[Guest Hazz]

HOW TO: Restore the System/Boot Drive Letter in Windows

Applies To

This article was previously published under Q223188

IN THIS TASK

SUMMARY

Change the System/Boot Drive Letter

IMPORTANT: This article contains information about modifying the registry. Before you modify the registry, make sure to back it up and make sure that you understand how to restore the registry if a problem occurs. For information about how to back up, restore, and edit the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

256986 Description of the Microsoft Windows Registry

SUMMARY

Warning Do not use the procedure that is described in this article to change a drive on a computer where the drive letter has not changed. If you do so, you may not be able to start your operating system. Follow the procedure that is described in this article only to recover from a drive letter change, not to change an existing computer drive to something else. Back up your registry keys before you make this change.

For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

249321 Unable to Log on if the Boot Partition Drive Letter Has Changed

This article describes how to change the system or boot drive letter in Windows. For the most part, this is not recommended, especially if the drive letter is the same as when Windows was installed. The only time that you may want to do this is when the drive letters get changed without any user intervention. This may happen when you break a mirror volume or there is a drive configuration change. This should be a rare occurrence and you should change the drive letters back to match the initial installation.

To change or swap drive letters on volumes that cannot otherwise be changed using the Disk Management snap-in, use the following steps.

Note In these steps, drive D refers to the (wrong) drive letter assigned to a volume, and drive C refers to the (new) drive letter you want to change to, or to assign to the volume.

This procedure swaps drive letters for drives C and D. If you do not need to swap drive letters, simply name the DosDeviceletter: value to any new drive letter not in use.

back to the top

Change the System/Boot Drive Letter

WARNING: If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

Make a full system backup of the computer and system state.

Log on as an Administrator.

Start Regedt32.exe.

Go to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMMountedDevices

Click MountedDevices.

On the Security menu, click Permissions.

Verify that Administrators have full control. Change this back when you are finished with these steps.

Quit Regedt32.exe, and then start Regedit.exe.

Locate the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMMountedDevices

Find the drive letter you want to change to (new). Look for "DosDevicesC:".

Right-click DosDevicesC:, and then click Rename.

Note You must use Regedit instead of Regedt32 to rename this registry key.

Rename it to an unused drive letter "DosDevicesZ:".

This frees up drive letter C.

Find the drive letter you want changed. Look for "DosDevicesD:".

Right-click DosDevicesD:, and then click Rename.

Rename it to the appropriate (new) drive letter "DosDevicesC:".

Click the value for DosDevicesZ:, click Rename, and then name it back to "DosDevicesD:".

Quit Regedit, and then start Regedt32.

Change the permissions back to the previous setting for Administrators (this should probably be Read Only).

Restart the computer.

[Guest mcwarre]

Use partition magic to change drive names; works a treat!

[Guest ferret]

Thanks Haz for your indepth reply.

Use partition magic to change drive names; works a treat!

However, seems to me that this is the easier option. Got Partition Magic 8 lying around somewhere, just have to find it!

Anyone know how to get the folder pictures up?

Thanks

[Guest spacecowboy6982]

Sorry to squeeze in on your post Ferret but you all seem pretty bloody technical i thought i'd ask a wee favour. How do I change my harddrive format from FAT32 to NTFS :?: It was NTFS before but it somehow changed.

And sorry Ferret I dont know how to do that m8 :?:

[Guest ferret]

Erm, I think you just format the drive in explorer or similar (right mouse click on the drive, format) and there should be a file system drop down list.

Don't know if you can change it without nuking your files but I'm usually wrong!

Posted from my SmartPhone!

[Guest spacecowboy6982]

I tried - get this message though...

g.JPG

[Guest PsychoDave]

Dunno bout XP but in 2000 you just run "convert driveletter: /fs:ntfs"

EDIT: run it from a command prompt :D

Then you'll need to reboot and it'll do it's stuff.

Doesn't destroy any data either :lol:

Hope that helps :)

[Guest spacecowboy6982]

Eek - not too sure what this means :

G.gif

[Guest PsychoDave]

S'cool It just means that the drive is in use and can't be converted yet.

If you reply yes it should shutdown windows and restart, then it'll kick into converting to NTFS. :lol:

Just make sure you've shut down everything thats running and if you're still a bit worried backup anything you can't afford to lose :?

Best of luck :D

Al

[Guest ferret]

Doesn't destroy any data either :lol:

Don't know if you can change it without nuking your files but I'm usually wrong!

Told you! :D

[Guest mcwarre]

Using this command will nuke your files and obviously you cant use this tool with a drive that is in use! Partition Magic will do it.....

[Guest PsychoDave]

As far as I was aware (which most of the time isn't all that much :) ) Convert.exe is a "non-destructive conversion routine" I got that from the Examgear 70-215 training guide.

As I said before I haven't tried it under XP but on 2000 it worked fine and the files remained intact. As to the drive being in use, when you select to convert it you will be prompted to "dismount the drive" which should restart the PC and kick off the conversion.

But you are right on the Partion Magic bit though it's a crackin program but you need to buy it. Convert.exe is free which is a consideration to some folks.

Normally I would bow to the wisdom of the guys here but I'm sure there's a smidgen of truth in what I'm sayin....maybe :D

[Guest spacecowboy6982]

Just maybe PsychoDave :) lol

"From the command line: CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS"

Worked for me - but now I wont be able to convert back to fat without a reformat as I didnt use partition magic which is a pretty neat app. It configures everything within the GUI so it makes it easier but hey, im not too bothered. Was mucking about with the registry too - system is flying now :shock:

Cheers 4 the help lads,

spacecowboy

[Guest PsychoDave]

lol good to hear :D

:oops: should have mentioned about not being able to go back to FAT but then again you wouldn't really gain much apart from compatability with older OS's and you've got PM8 for that now :lol:

Take it easy,

Al :)