My Documents on different partition?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Robin
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R

Robin

Can I put My Documents on a separate partition from the OS and retain
full functionality?

TIA

Robin
 
Yes and yes. It's not at all necessary, but it can be a handy arrangement.

But - and there's always a 'but' - you have to do it the right way.
Different shell folders need different techniques to be moved successfully.
Here's how to do it for My Documents, care of MVP Kent W. England:

"Be certain that no documents are open before you start a move process,
otherwise the move will be incomplete and your old folder will not be
deleted. You will have to close open processes and then manually move any
files that were not moved in the move operation. Best to do this right after
a logon.

One way to move My Documents is to right-click the My Documents folder under
Desktop in Windows Explorer and select Properties. Move the folder with the
Move button. This is the only shell folder that can be moved from its
properties tab. Be careful to enter the path to the new "My Documents"
folder, not to its parent. In other words, if you want the new "My
Documents" folder to be D:\My Documents, then you must enter that string in
the Target box."

Ted Zieglar
 
Thanks Ted. But on reflection, I guess what I really meant to ask was
not about just My Documents but the whole Documents and Settings
folder. I can see very real advantages in having this on another
partition if a reinstallation is needed. Program Files too might be a
good idea.

Robin
 
I'll deal with Program Files first. Many programs, including most Microsoft
software, will install a large portion of themselves into the system
partition no matter what you do. Other software won't work properly, or at
all, if installed in anything other than the system partition. That's
because Windows expects to find application programs in the system
partition.

Moreover, it makes little sense to install software outside the system
partiton, since the registry is part of the system partition. If you need to
reinstall Windows you'll need to reinstall all your software anyway, so
there's no real advantage to installing your software anywhere else.

Documents and Settings cannot be moved en masse to a different partition,
although you can move most of the shell folders (My Documents, Temporary
Internet Files, etc.) to another partition. Before you start moving shell
folders, ask yourself "why am I doing this?". In particular, moving shell
folders is no substitute for backing up.

Here is the entire article by MVP Kent England:

"How to Move Shell Folders (and contents)"
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_shell_folders.htm

FWIW, here's what I have done. Remember, this is only one person's idea: I
have My Documents, My Pictures, My Music and My Videos in their own
partitions. I moved Temporary Internet Files to the partition where I store
my backups. And I moved my (Outlook Express) message store and my address
book to My Documents. I didn't need to do any of this; it's just for
convenience when backing up.
 
Thanks very much Ted. A very comprehensive picture.

As for mail, I don't use Outlook Express (except as a backup store),
but Eudora, and I store all the non-program files on a dedicated
partition. It's then easy to access mail from different desktops. I
know it can be done with OE but it's more complicated and I once lost
some mail by getting it wrong.

Thanks again

Robin
 
If what you are concerned about is a system crash or just having to
reinstall, I suggest using something like ghost or any imaging program. I
have 3 partitions on my HD, with the OS on C, Programs on D and data on E.
I have placed ghost images on both DVD and also on the data drive. I can
restore the images in much less time than it takes to reinstall XP. The
last time I restored my C and D drives it only took about 20 minutes and
sure is faster and easier than reinstalling XP and much more reliable then
using the XP restore feature.

Good luck
 
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