Can I change drive letters?

  • Thread starter Thread starter The Litwaks
  • Start date Start date
T

The Litwaks

Over the weekend I removed my old hard drive, that was partitioned
into two partitions, C and D, and replaced it with a new hard drive.
When I started the computer I installed Windows XP on this new, clean
drive. For some reason, my computer thinks that Windows is on E and a
different device is on C. No matter what I do, following the
instructions for jump switch setting on the drive, and even though the
BIOS says the new drive is Primary Master, I can't get the system to
recognize the XP drive as E. This means I can't reinstall my printer
driver, because it insists on putting files on C, even if that's not
where XP is. THis is not a configurable value.

Is there some way to tell the operating system that the drive XP is
on should be C forever? I've tried all the hardware things I can think
of , including calling the manufacturer of the old drive for proper
jumper settings to be a secondary drive. With or without the old drive,
the new drive is still E, and now, after playing with the cables to make
the new drive primary master, my CD ROM drive is invisible. ANyway, is
there a software fix for the drive letter? Thanks.

Ken
 
you can do it right within XP.....right click...my computer...manage....disk
management...
 
Hi,

1) You will need to redo the clean installation.

2) You will need to remove the device that was assigned C before you begin
(1). Zip and other drives that are attached during setup are known to cause
this issue.

The only way to change the assigned system drive letter is to do a clean
installation. You can reattach the removed drives after installation is
complete.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
Hi Marty,

Thanks for the suggestion. WHen I do this, I get the message
"Windows cannot modify the drive letter of your system volume or boot
volume." Is there a way around this, perhaps from DOS?

Ken
 
Hi Marty,

Thanks for the suggestion. WHen I do this, I get the message
"Windows cannot modify the drive letter of your system volume or boot
volume." Is there a way around this, perhaps from DOS?

Ken
 
Hi Ken,

Is the drive set as a master on the primary ide? Or is it attached to a
controller?

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
Thanks to all for your help. I detached some devices and reinstalled
WIndows XP and solved this problem. XP believes it is now on C.

Ken
 
Cool, thanks for the feedback Ken.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
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