Moving Program Files folder

[suklee]

I want to move an older IDE hard drive (the 160gb hd in sig) out of my system, but first I must of course empty all the data on it. Sticky issue is that I've installed programs on here so the Program Files and Program Files (x86) folders need to be moved.

Has anyone attempted anything like this before? Is there a good way to do this or must I manually reinstall everything?

 

[QuixoticOne]

You lost me.. so you're getting rid of a drive, no big deal.
Where are you moving the contents of that drive TO?
If you're just asking if you can take an old system disc that is currently the boot drive/partition e.g. C: and replace that physical disc drive with a different one and move the data, operating system, programs, and all to a replacement drive and end up with a bootable OS on the new drive with all your programs / data, yes, just make a partition clone of the old drive/partition onto a new partition on the new drive, you're done.

Now if you're asking if it is possible to take the PROGRAM FILES et. al. (i.e. installed programs) on ONE drive and ADD/MERGE them to the ALREADY WORKING / INSTALLED programs on ANOTHER OS drive while KEEPING the OS and already installed stuff on the DESTINATION drive, uh, yeah, that is difficult and sometimes impossible and often leads to stuff that is at least somewhat messed up. There's nothing really wrong with just copying program directories out of the Program Files et. al. folders to another system and so on, but you generally don't end up with things installed in the "start menu" and the desktop shortcuts, you'll probably lose your user profile / preferences stuff since that is often in the registry or in your user Application Data et. al. folders, et. al.


For the first case, whole partition copy to a new drive, though --

You can use partition imaging / cloning tools to copy or backup and restore (possibly onto a totally different drive / partition) any given partition.

Paragon Drive Backup Express (requires name and email for registration)
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/db-express/

Macrium Reflect (props to Airjrdn for suggesting this)
Macrium
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp

If you have a Seagate or Maxtor hard drive, you can use the DiscWizard (Seagate) or MaxBlast (Maxtor) software.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/

Look at bottom of page under "General Software"
Seagate and Maxtor

I haven't tried this one but it looks promising.
Self Image
http://selfimage.excelcia.org/

freeware as in open source:
http://www.clonezilla.org/
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php

Commercial software some of which are limited capability versions that are freely given out in one version, and have more capabilities if you pay for a better version:
http://www.macrium.com/ReflectFree.asp
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/index.htm
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/db-express/
http://www.macrium.com/ReflectFree.asp
http://www.fssdev.com/products/casper/

Maybe free commercial software with limited capabilities:
These are basically limited versions of Acronis' product AFAIK.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/
"DiscWizard" is free *if* you have a Seagate drive connected to your system.
"MaxBlast" is free *if* you have a Maxtor drive connected to your system.

Popular commercial software on sale:
(actually this one below, acronis' true image home 11 is NOT free, but is $10 or so; the vnunet link is supposedly the current / best deal that still is offered -- the price depends on which links you click to buy it.. confusing, I know...)
http://acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/
http://www.acronis.net/promo/ati4free/
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/d...cronis-true-image-home

 

[suklee]

OK here is what I've set up:

WD Raptor 34gb C:, Vista boot drive

Seagate 500gb E: and F:, equal sized partitions. I have pointed Vista to use E: as documents.

Hitachi 160gb as G: (THIS is the hd I would like to take out) but where my program files reside.

Could I MOVE everything to say E:, take out the Hitachi, and then manually change E: to G:?

Sorry if you have addressed this question already, am typing this from my phone.

Thanks!

 

[QuixoticOne]

Maybe...I am confused.
What do you mean my E: is your Documents? As in you made Vista's "built in" user login "My Documents" type profile directory go to E: and NOT C: anymore?

What do you mean G: has Program Files/Program Files (x86)?

1: As in you used some system tweaker to make Vista's C: NOT have Program Files etc. on it but it is on G: INSTEAD? If so I'm shocked a lot of programs aren't breaking because of that even though it SHOULD be possible without problem.

2: Or do you mean you had some OTHER UNRELATED OS install having NOTHING to do with C:Vista that you had used on the drive that is NOW G: and that OTHER OS had its ProgramFiles/... on the drive that is NOW G: and so the current C:Vista has NO idea about / use of the programs on G: but you just want to get Vista to use those in addition to the Program Files installed on C:Vista?

One possible strategy is....
1: *copy* everything on G:160 to E:500gb-part. (I assume that'll fit)
2: *copy* the "Documents" on E:500gb-part to G:160gb (will it fit?)
3: Fix whatever you did to make E: as documents to now make G: as documents.
4: Shut down, take out G:160 drive.
5: Boot into safe mode and change the mount letter of E: to G: so the path to Program FIles stays the same if it'll let you do such a change even in safe mode.
6: Reboot and it should work as well as it used to hopefully.

Though depending on what Vista really knows about and is using G: Program Files for it may not either let you make the change or may not help you have Grogram Files actually work within VIsta assuming it isn't working now on G:....

You could use a tool like UltimateBootCD / a BartPE CD to help you move / copy / tweak stuff while you're booted from the CD instead of in Vista. You might get away with doing stuff in SAFE MODE booting from C: though. You could get to a command prompt from booting the Vista install CD too and do certain kinds of things from there.

 

[suklee]

For the documents: YES, instead of C:\Users\My Name\Documents (or whatever it is) I have pointed it to E:\Documents.

Re: Program Files - I have simply pointed the installation programs to install into G:\Program Files (or x86). No other unrelated OS's involved... only one involved is Vista Home Premium 64-bit.

Do I have to do things in safe mode? Could I just move Program Files from G: to E:, boot into Vista, and then change the drive lettering from E: to G:. Or will Vista freak.. guess there's only one way to find out! If it's more trouble than it's worth, I'll just uninstall the apps one by one and re-install them.

Appreciate your help.

 

[Navid]

If you change E to G, your music, pictures, ...., which are on E will not be accessible anymore.

To be safe, make an image of your OS partition first.
Copy your 2 program files folders from G to F.
Shut down and remove Drive that contains G.
Boot up. None of your programs will work now. You will get errors for startups that fail to find their executables.
Use the disk management tool and change drive letter F to G and reboot.
Now, everything should work.

 

[suklee]

The image of the OS partition is a good idea, I will try that. I can see that safe mode can help when moving the program files folders from G to F. (Or E)

 

[Navid]

Originally posted by: Kai920
The image of the OS partition is a good idea, I will try that. I can see that safe mode can help when moving the program files folders from G to F. (Or E)

I wouldn't do that if I were you.
As I said, copy them, not move.
Follow the instructions step by step and every step.

 

[BlueAcolyte]

You know, you could just make another partition and change that letter to G instead...

 

[suklee]

I ended up using Acronis Disk Director (http://www.acronis.com/homecom...skdirector/index.html)

First I moved all non-essential files off my G: drive.

Then I used the Partition Manager (http://www.acronis.com/homecom...tor/partitioning.html) and merged G: into F:, rebooted and re-assigned F: into G:. Rebooted and still wasn't working... then I remembered that the software forced me to copy the data into a directory. Once I moved the files from this directory into the new G:\Program Files and G:\Program Files (x86), everything worked after another reboot.

Thanks everyone for your help & advice.

 

[QuixoticOne]

YHPM

Senior Anandtech Moderator
Common Courtesy

---------------------------------------------------------


Maybe...I am confused.
What do you mean my E: is your Documents? As in you made Vista's "built in" user login "My Documents" type profile directory go to E: and NOT C: anymore?

What do you mean G: has Program Files/Program Files (x86)?

1: As in you used some system tweaker to make Vista's C: NOT have Program Files etc. on it but it is on G: INSTEAD? If so I'm shocked a lot of programs aren't breaking because of that even though it SHOULD be possible without problem.

2: Or do you mean you had some OTHER UNRELATED OS install having NOTHING to do with C:Vista that you had used on the drive that is NOW G: and that OTHER OS had its ProgramFiles/... on the drive that is NOW G: and so the current C:Vista has NO idea about / use of the programs on G: but you just want to get Vista to use those in addition to the Program Files installed on C:Vista?

One possible strategy is....
1: *copy* everything on G:160 to E:500gb-part. (I assume that'll fit)
2: *copy* the "Documents" on E:500gb-part to G:160gb (will it fit?)
3: Fix whatever you did to make E: as documents to now make G: as documents.
4: Shut down, take out G:160 drive.
5: Boot into safe mode and change the mount letter of E: to G: so the path to Program FIles stays the same if it'll let you do such a change even in safe mode.
6: Reboot and it should work as well as it used to hopefully.

Though depending on what Vista really knows about and is using G: Program Files for it may not either let you make the change or may not help you have Grogram Files actually work within VIsta assuming it isn't working now on G:....

You could use a tool like UltimateBootCD / a BartPE CD to help you move / copy / tweak stuff while you're booted from the CD instead of in Vista. You might get away with doing stuff in SAFE MODE booting from C: though. You could get to a command prompt from booting the Vista install CD too and do certain kinds of things from there.

 

[Navid]

Originally posted by: QuixoticOne
Maybe...I am confused.

Just a recommendation:

PM the guy and ask him to respond to your questions, instead of spamming the thread with the same post over and over again.
If he doesn't, let it be.

 

[QuixoticOne]

Maybe...I am confused.
What do you mean my E: is your Documents? As in you made Vista's "built in" user login "My Documents" type profile directory go to E: and NOT C: anymore?

What do you mean G: has Program Files/Program Files (x86)?

1: As in you used some system tweaker to make Vista's C: NOT have Program Files etc. on it but it is on G: INSTEAD? If so I'm shocked a lot of programs aren't breaking because of that even though it SHOULD be possible without problem.

2: Or do you mean you had some OTHER UNRELATED OS install having NOTHING to do with C:Vista that you had used on the drive that is NOW G: and that OTHER OS had its ProgramFiles/... on the drive that is NOW G: and so the current C:Vista has NO idea about / use of the programs on G: but you just want to get Vista to use those in addition to the Program Files installed on C:Vista?

One possible strategy is....
1: *copy* everything on G:160 to E:500gb-part. (I assume that'll fit)
2: *copy* the "Documents" on E:500gb-part to G:160gb (will it fit?)
3: Fix whatever you did to make E: as documents to now make G: as documents.
4: Shut down, take out G:160 drive.
5: Boot into safe mode and change the mount letter of E: to G: so the path to Program FIles stays the same if it'll let you do such a change even in safe mode.
6: Reboot and it should work as well as it used to hopefully.

Though depending on what Vista really knows about and is using G: Program Files for it may not either let you make the change or may not help you have Grogram Files actually work within VIsta assuming it isn't working now on G:....

You could use a tool like UltimateBootCD / a BartPE CD to help you move / copy / tweak stuff while you're booted from the CD instead of in Vista. You might get away with doing stuff in SAFE MODE booting from C: though. You could get to a command prompt from booting the Vista install CD too and do certain kinds of things from there.

 

[QuixoticOne]

Maybe...I am confused.
What do you mean my E: is your Documents? As in you made Vista's "built in" user login "My Documents" type profile directory go to E: and NOT C: anymore?

What do you mean G: has Program Files/Program Files (x86)?

1: As in you used some system tweaker to make Vista's C: NOT have Program Files etc. on it but it is on G: INSTEAD? If so I'm shocked a lot of programs aren't breaking because of that even though it SHOULD be possible without problem.

2: Or do you mean you had some OTHER UNRELATED OS install having NOTHING to do with C:Vista that you had used on the drive that is NOW G: and that OTHER OS had its ProgramFiles/... on the drive that is NOW G: and so the current C:Vista has NO idea about / use of the programs on G: but you just want to get Vista to use those in addition to the Program Files installed on C:Vista?

One possible strategy is....
1: *copy* everything on G:160 to E:500gb-part. (I assume that'll fit)
2: *copy* the "Documents" on E:500gb-part to G:160gb (will it fit?)
3: Fix whatever you did to make E: as documents to now make G: as documents.
4: Shut down, take out G:160 drive.
5: Boot into safe mode and change the mount letter of E: to G: so the path to Program FIles stays the same if it'll let you do such a change even in safe mode.
6: Reboot and it should work as well as it used to hopefully.

Though depending on what Vista really knows about and is using G: Program Files for it may not either let you make the change or may not help you have Grogram Files actually work within VIsta assuming it isn't working now on G:....

You could use a tool like UltimateBootCD / a BartPE CD to help you move / copy / tweak stuff while you're booted from the CD instead of in Vista. You might get away with doing stuff in SAFE MODE booting from C: though. You could get to a command prompt from booting the Vista install CD too and do certain kinds of things from there.

 

[QuixoticOne]

Maybe...I am confused.
What do you mean my E: is your Documents? As in you made Vista's "built in" user login "My Documents" type profile directory go to E: and NOT C: anymore?

What do you mean G: has Program Files/Program Files (x86)?

1: As in you used some system tweaker to make Vista's C: NOT have Program Files etc. on it but it is on G: INSTEAD? If so I'm shocked a lot of programs aren't breaking because of that even though it SHOULD be possible without problem.

2: Or do you mean you had some OTHER UNRELATED OS install having NOTHING to do with C:Vista that you had used on the drive that is NOW G: and that OTHER OS had its ProgramFiles/... on the drive that is NOW G: and so the current C:Vista has NO idea about / use of the programs on G: but you just want to get Vista to use those in addition to the Program Files installed on C:Vista?

One possible strategy is....
1: *copy* everything on G:160 to E:500gb-part. (I assume that'll fit)
2: *copy* the "Documents" on E:500gb-part to G:160gb (will it fit?)
3: Fix whatever you did to make E: as documents to now make G: as documents.
4: Shut down, take out G:160 drive.
5: Boot into safe mode and change the mount letter of E: to G: so the path to Program FIles stays the same if it'll let you do such a change even in safe mode.
6: Reboot and it should work as well as it used to hopefully.

Though depending on what Vista really knows about and is using G: Program Files for it may not either let you make the change or may not help you have Grogram Files actually work within VIsta assuming it isn't working now on G:....

You could use a tool like UltimateBootCD / a BartPE CD to help you move / copy / tweak stuff while you're booted from the CD instead of in Vista. You might get away with doing stuff in SAFE MODE booting from C: though. You could get to a command prompt from booting the Vista install CD too and do certain kinds of things from there.

 

[waggy]

holly spamzilla!

i thnk asking once would be enough heh