Changing HD drive letter/path?

[Colin]

I've just installed a brand new SATA Seagate HD, and I'm having problems with changing the drives letter.

 

I installed Windows on the new harddisk while I still had the old drive in there (which had a windows installation itself), but now I've taken out the old HD, and my new SATA drive is still registering it's drive letter as D:/

 

I've gone into Windows own disk management, and tried changing the drive letter manually, but it comes up with the messege of "Windows cannot modify the drive letter of your system or boot volume."

 

I know it's abit of a petty thing to sort out, but I'd rather the drive just be registered with the drive letter of C:/

 

I don't want to re-format and re-install Windows again just to sort it, so if anyone has got any ideas of how to sort this out then it'll be much appreciated?

[Dieter]

Partition magic can change that easily.

[Colin]

Partition magic can change that easily.

 

Kool kool, cheers for that.

 

I've heard of Partition Magic before, but I've never had the need to look into it.

 

It's been abit of a learning process for me installing this HD, as I've had to frequently change things in the bios aswell.

 

I'll get hold of Partition Magic then, and I'll update this post in about an hour or so to say if it worked or not.

[Fillado]

It's quite hard to change the drive letter of the system drive, as there are a ton of registry entries etc. that are linked to it.

[Colin]

It's quite hard to change the drive letter of the system drive, as there are a ton of registry entries etc. that are linked to it.

 

That's exactly what I was thinking................so I wasn't sure it'll be possible.

 

Surely if I change the drive letter, then all installed programs are going to be looking in the wrong places for stuff, and Windows will be aswell?

 

Currently downloading Partition Magic, so hopefully it'll work.

[Colin]

It went tits up. And now I can't boot into Windows as the file xmnt2002.exe is not found. This file is a part of Partition Magic, and because the registry keys have changed then Partition Magic can't find the file.

 

I need to get into Regedit somehow to sort Partiton Magic's key out, but apparently I can only access Regedit in Windows itself and not in DOS.

 

But if I may be able to load up Windows somehow using Safemode.

 

Edit - Can't even load Windows up in safemode for some reason? Just sits there on the screen before it jumps into Windows itself.

[Dieter]

It went tits up. And now I can't boot into Windows as the file xmnt2002.exe is not found. This file is a part of Partition Magic, and because the registry keys have changed then Partition Magic can't find the file.

 

I need to get into Regedit somehow to sort Partiton Magic's key out, but apparently I can only access Regedit in Windows itself and not in DOS.

 

But if I may be able to load up Windows somehow using Safemode.

 

Edit - Can't even load Windows up in safemode for some reason? Just sits there on the screen before it jumps into Windows itself.

 

My deepest apologies. I appear not to have read your initial post completely through, I didn't see you had installed Windows on there, sorry

 

The same thing happened to me a few month ago. Bleh that sucked.

 

 

A thousand pardons

[Colin]

My deepest apologies. I appear not to have read your initial post completely through, I didn't see you had installed Windows on there, sorry

 

The same thing happened to me a few month ago. Bleh that sucked.

 

 

A thousand pardons

 

No worries. It's not your fault.

 

Errrrr...................now I'm stuck. So like I said, I can't boot into Windows at the mo, and I need to change Partition Magic's resistry keys somehow.

 

Anyone at all?

[Dieter]

No worries. It's not your fault.

 

Errrrr...................now I'm stuck. So like I said, I can't boot into Windows at the mo, and I need to change Partition Magic's resistry keys somehow.

 

Anyone at all?

 

I think your best bet is reinstalling Windows... it's a new drive so I hope you haven't lost too much porn... or other things.

[Colin]

I think your best bet is reinstalling Windows... it's a new drive so I hope you haven't lost too much porn... or other things.

 

It's actually my familys computer, as I'm using my Laptop at the mo.

 

My Dad has just gone off on one at me, because I copied all the families needed files over from the old HD then formatted it.

 

So all his files are actually on the new HD. He totally flipped out at me, and I just told him to shove it, as I'll get it fixed.

 

I've downloaded a Partition Magic Boot CD, which I'm burning now. Then I'll boot from this on my families comp, and hopefully I'll get it sorted.

[Dieter]

It's actually my familys computer, as I'm using my Laptop at the mo.

 

My Dad has just gone off on one at me, because I copied all the families needed files over from the old HD then formatted it.

 

So all his files are actually on the new HD. He totally flipped out at me, and I just told him to shove it, as I'll get it fixed.

 

I've downloaded a Partition Magic Boot CD, which I'm burning now. Then I'll boot from this on my families comp, and hopefully I'll get it sorted.

 

 

I feared something like that. Couldn't you try popping the HD into another pc?

[Colin]

The Partition Magic boot CD wouldn't work, so I've chucked back in the old HD and started to install another Windows installation on it so I can get into a Windows boot up.

 

Once Windows has loaded back onto the old HD, I can then access the Regedit file on the SATA HD and take out Partition Magic's registry key.

 

This is the registry information I've been going on in which to edit. I know it's a risky procedure, but I just don't want to re-format the new drive again and do all the updates, as usually it takes nearly a day to sort a new Windows installation.

 

xmnt2002.exe registry edit stuff