Weird happenings after installing 2nd hard disk

[John H Meyers]

After my previous WinXP Pro computer's power supply failed,
I installed its hard disk as a second drive in a newer computer
to copy my files from it; that disk became the "F:" drive
on this new computer, while Windows continues starting up
from the original "C:" drive of this new computer, as usual.

The weird observations are:

o Portions of the old computer's "Registry" have sometimes
shown up in "Regedit" (although not at this moment),
with some unusual "branch" names containing the drive letter "F"
(I wish I had written down the precise names, but too late now),
as though that drive's registry had been automatically "attached,"
against any wish of mine to "merge" it into this computer.

o I happen to have just used a shortcut in my "Send to" menu
which calls for a program which works just fine,
although it then dawned upon me
that I had never actually installed it in this computer at all!

My "Send to" shortcut was copied to my current profile
from the original shortcut in my old profile in the "F:" drive,
which specifies this exact "Target" line:
"C:\Program Files\Universal Extractor\UniExtract.exe"

Not only do both my original and current "Send to" shortcuts
still display the same (old) modification date,
but so do their "MD5" checksums match,
indicating that they are absolutely identical:

F:\Documents and Settings\user\SendTo\UniExtract.lnk
10/27/2007 09:07 AM 769 -r-------
cff0c93d0181ad4414b0527a08f4cd1d UniExtract.lnk

C:\Documents and Settings\user\SendTo\UniExtract.lnk
10/27/2007 09:07 AM 769 -ra------
cff0c93d0181ad4414b0527a08f4cd1d UniExtract.lnk

When Windows is asked to display the latter's "Properties,"
the "Target" line it displays is still:
"C:\Program Files\Universal Extractor\UniExtract.exe"

As secret agent "Maxwell Smart" used to say, "Would You Believe"
that despite the non-existence of any such current directory
as "C:\Program Files\Universal Extractor" (causing Windows
to even most annoyingly refuse to switch to the "General" tab
of shortcut properties), this shortcut still runs the program!

Approximately equally amazingly, clicking "Find Target"
abruptly changes the leading "C:" to "F:" in the displayed
shortcut properties, and opens the original program path on drive F:
"F:\Program Files\Universal Extractor\UniExtract.exe"

I am wondering what exactly is going on here,
both registry-wise and shortcut-wise?

Are all programs that once were installed on my old computer
(now the "F:" drive in my new computer)
actually executing from the old "F:" drive,
even though I've re-installed most of them on my new "C:" drive?

What will happen when I remove that old drive again from this computer
to return it to its old home, after the old power supply is replaced?
(besides that "System Restore" will not work for any old restore points!)

Thanks for any illumination to dispel the notion
that Windows is making my new computer totally dependent
upon a _temporarily_ installed "F:" drive,
which it has never been asked to use for anything,
other than my copying old files from it, to my new computer.

---

Maxwell Smart and "Would You Believe?"
http://www.wouldyoubelieve.com/phrases.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Get_Smart

--

 

[John H Meyers]

What I was saying is that Registry hives from my old computer's drive
(currently installed into this new computer as F
seem to have once been loaded into the current computer's registry,
and were added as "additional branches"

The old computer's drive may look like the "primary" drive
to this computer, although it still boots from the C: partition
of the new computer's hard disk.

When does this happen?

How to make sure it doesn't happen?

TIA