Move \Users folder once for all

How can we move the \Users folder to a different location (e.g. from
c:\users to d:\users?

I know that one can manually change the location of the subfolders of a
specific user (e.g. c:\users\<myname>\Documents) using Properties|Location.
I am looking for a solution to move the \Users folder location so that the
folders for new users automatically go there.
I read this is possible at setup using the Vista Automated Installation Kit
to create an Autounattend.xml file, so I assume there is a registry setting.

What about Outlook and Windows Mail? Do they store the Emails under
\Users\...\Documents or do we still have to move them manually.

The background of my question is that I am using a Matrix Raid with my swap
and system partition striped and my data partition mirrored and want the
user data on the mirror:
Stripe:
Swap: no backup
System: image backup after significant changes
Mirror:
Data: daily backups

The following Autounattend.xml file using the setup /unattend switch worked
for me.
setup.exe /unattend:a:\Autounattend.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<unattend xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:unattend">
<settings pass="oobeSystem">
<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup"
publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS"
processorArchitecture="x86">
<FolderLocations>
<ProfilesDirectory>D:\Users</ProfilesDirectory>
</FolderLocations>
</component>
</settings>
</unattend>

It only worked for x86 and using the setup switch.
Could not get it working for x64. Tried different settings for
processorArchitecture "*", "ia64". The valid values seem not to be
documented in AIK.
Could not get it working with booting from DVD and Autounattend.xml on
Floppy.

[groovyKimo]

A colleague came up with another solution:

Change the ProfilesDirectory under the following registry key:
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList

This will cause user data of new users to be created at the new location.
The data of the user created at setup will stay on the system drive.

Thanks! I'll get my new hardware next week, so stay tuned...

Well, it's some time, but here is my promised update:

I decided against using a mount point for any of the user folders. I wanted to have the admin account in its default location and my user files at D:\MyAccount.

For this I used Junction Points, generated with this tool: Junction Link Magic. With this tool I also remade the hidden Junction Points Vista makes in the user folders, which you can't copy somehow.

The only drawback I found so far is that Vista ist not indexing my files through the Junction Point C:\Users\MyAccount. Guess this would work with MountVol. But I need other stuff in the root of D and don't want many partitions on my drive...

So I'm looking for a way to change indexed paths from D:\MyAccount to C:\Users\MyAccount. Any clues?

Yeah, that's the reason I made it this way too! :)

First to say, this is very advanced stuff. Configuring things somehow is the first, maintaining the changes the second. If you rely on your machine and don't really know what you're doing it may not be the best thing to tinker around. If you want it save and easy you better look for a mac... ;)

You should keep a file on a second, save machine what, when and how you changed. If every new user should be on D, then the users folder should point to D, with mountvol or a Junction Point. Think of it as a tunnel. Vista gets the data through it without knowing it went to the other side. If that fails somehow, your system is broken and you will need some commandline skills to fix it. Or a new installation.

Vistas indexing doesn't reach through the tunnel. I don't get results searching in c:\users\account (which is the second top folder in the data explorer), only in D:\account (which I need to mark under Computer). But when I click c:\users\account, I see D:\account. Otherwise one would have multiple results for one file, seen through multiple Junction Points.

Junction Points can't (yet) moved or copied. You need to remake all the original ones if you copied you account. Make shure you downloaded the Vista version, which is alpha. Just define the two ends of the "datatunnel".

I'm not a big coder. Coding this is not a big deal, but bugfixing and supporting users with thousands of different systems out there — leaving a PC dead with an error...

Finally, there's no great need for partitions today. Unless you are a backupmaniac like me: Backing up the data daily incremental and mirroring it weekly somewhere else. Then you don't want your some 100 GB included in your weekly C-image. But I never lost my data since 20 years and some HD- and systemcrashs... ;)

Ah, a backup-brother! :) I've lost important data I had on a XP-desktop - I hadn't a backup of that then. I use Acronis and SyncBack. Yeah, I know that late-night-problem...

If you have several machines and some time - play with one. Junction Points are fun. If a program sets its userfolder fix in your document root, move it, make a JP instead and hide it. The document root is clean again. :)

[gary.lane]

I know this is an old thread but it seems the most relevant to what I need to do. I will try it out tonight but just wanted to check if you had discoveerd any untoward effects of doign this? I was a little put out to read:

on the Technet site under this key change.

Hi, just registered to thank you for this brillian Idea !! :)

Did you this for programms folders too? And it's hopefully working? I'll try when I got my new hardware. Thinking of 50GB for Vista x64, 150GB Programms and the rest for the users directory.

Jawdropping simple! Thank you again! Greez!

[mrgcav]

How to move the special folders in Windows Vista
• Ramesh Srinivasan • Published Nov 28, 2006

Introduction
This article describes how to move the special folders in Windows® Vista.

Moving the special folders
Windows Vista lets you easily relocate the shell folder paths for Documents, Music and Pictures folder using the Property sheet. Note that in Windows XP, selectively moving the My Pictures or the My Music folders required a registry edit. This is no longer the case in Vista.
Method 1 USELESS
To move a special folder to a different drive or path, follow these steps:
• Create the destination folder first
• Click the Start button
• Right-click the special folder (Documents, Music, or Pictures) and choose Properties
• Select the Location tab
• Click Move and select the target folder
• Click Apply
• Click Yes when you're prompted to move the files to new location
• Click OK
The shell folder is now moved to the new location.

Method 2: Using Registry Editor
To accomplish this using Registry editor, follow these steps:
• Create the destination folder first
• Click Start, Run and type Regedit.exe
• For per-user special folders, navigate to the following location:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders
• For per-system special folders, navigate to the following location:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders
• Double-click the corresponding shell folder name
• Change the Value data accordingly, mentioning the destination path
• Close Regedit.exe
Default shell folder paths - Listing
Per-user special folders
Value name (Special folder) Value data
{374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B} %USERPROFILE%\Downloads
AppData %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming
Cache %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temp orary Internet Files
Cookies %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Co okies
Desktop %USERPROFILE%\Desktop
Favorites %USERPROFILE%\Favorites
History %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Hist ory
Local AppData %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local
My Music %USERPROFILE%\Music
My Pictures %USERPROFILE%\Pictures
My Video %USERPROFILE%\Videos
Nethood %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Ne twork Shortcuts
Personal %USERPROFILE%\Documents
PrintHood %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Pr inter Shortcuts
Programs %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\St art Menu\Programs
Recent %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Re cent
SendTo %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Se ndTo
Start Menu %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\St art Menu
Startup %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\St art Menu\Programs\Startup
Templates %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Te mplates

Per-system special folders
Value name (Special folder) Value data
{3D644C9B-1FB8-4f30-9B45-F670235F79C0} %PUBLIC%\Downloads
Common AppData %ProgramData%
Common Desktop %PUBLIC%\Desktop
Common Documents %PUBLIC%\Documents
Common Programs %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs
Common Start Menu %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu
Common Startup %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
Common Templates %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Templates
CommonMusic %PUBLIC%\Music
CommonPictures %PUBLIC%\Pictures
CommonVideo %PUBLIC%\Videos

To reset the shell folder paths for Music/Documents/Pictures/Videos folders in Windows Vista, you may use the REG file reset_music_pictures_docs_path.reg. Download and save the file to the Desktop. Right-click on the file and choose Merge.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

;Resets the shell folder paths for Music, Pictures, Videos and Documents
;For Windows Vista systems only
;Created on March 30, 2007

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curre ntVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders]
"My Music"=hex(2):25,00,55,00,53,00,45,00,52,00,50,00, 52,00,4f,00,46,00,49,00,\
4c,00,45,00,25,00,5c,00,4d,00,75,00,73,00,69,00,63 ,00,00,00
"My Pictures"=hex(2):25,00,55,00,53,00,45,00,52,00,50, 00,52,00,4f,00,46,00,49,\
00,4c,00,45,00,25,00,5c,00,50,00,69,00,63,00,74,00 ,75,00,72,00,65,00,73,00,\
00,00
"My Video"=hex(2):25,00,55,00,53,00,45,00,52,00,50,00, 52,00,4f,00,46,00,49,00,\
4c,00,45,00,25,00,5c,00,56,00,69,00,64,00,65,00,6f ,00,73,00,00,00
"Personal"=hex(2):25,00,55,00,53,00,45,00,52,00,50 ,00,52,00,4f,00,46,00,49,00,\
4c,00,45,00,25,00,5c,00,44,00,6f,00,63,00,75,00,6d ,00,65,00,6e,00,74,00,73,\
00,00,00

How can I move the "users" folder???
Is there an easy way to move the user folder off the system drive? I understand the concept of virtual folders, but when i drag and drop a file from my desktop to my "Matthew" folder i have displayed on the desktop, it goes to c:\Users\Matthew I want my Users folder on my E:\ drive (e:\users\matthew) Even better would be if i could have "c:\users" just be "e:\"

Re: How can I move the "users" folder??? Need it off the C: drive!!!!
If you want to re-direct all your user data folders in one shot, you essentially have two options:
1. You can use unattend.xml (i believe there is a blog post on this) during setup to define exactly where you want your Profile 'Users' directory to be created. All new profiles will be created at that location.
2. You can also individually redirect all your profile folders using the following method if you already have the OS installed. However one thing to point out is that once you have the OS installed, you cannot move the root profile folder, i.e. Users directory or the username folder itself.
1. Go to the Start>Username folder.
2. Select all the folders in the explorer window you want to move/re-direct.
3. Cut-paste them to the new location of your choosing.
This will also redirect all the folders to the new location and update the registry entries for them as well in a manner similar to the manual redirection via the locations tab as suggested above.

Actually, there IS a way to move existing profiles and the profiles root directory, although I'm sure it's unsupported, use at your own risk, etc.
The key HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList includes a value for the ProfilesDirectory that points to the root profile directory (i.e. %SystemDrive%\Users), and each subkey represents the location of a single profile, identified by account SID. User profiles don't all have to be under the root profile directory, but the Default and All Users profiles do. Newly copied profiles (either from default or roaming) go into the root profile directory.
Don't try to move a profile that's in use. Changes to the profile root directory only take effect properly after reboot.
Even if you move the profile, there MIGHT be paths that lead to the old directory (although this isn't supposed to be happening to support roaming profiles correctly; romaing profiles may be located anywhere when cached on the client machines).

Wow. That registry trick works awesome. Thats exactly what i needed. Now my e:\ drive has Users, Documents, Images, Videos, Music, and Downloads folders, with the virtual folders under 'e:\Users\Matthew' and 'e:\Users\Ashley' linking back out to thier respective folder in the root directory (e:\)
All this so when my 'Matthew' folder is displayed on the desktop, i can drag and drop files to it and they physically reside at e:\Users\Matthew. From there further sorting into the Virtual folders is easy.

We provide an unattend setting (Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup | FolderLocations | ProfilesDirectory) for doing exactly this! I would recommend applying this setting during a clean install. But beware - if you move the Users folder to a location other than the system volume, upgrades will be blocked!!!

A description of known issues with the FolderLocation settings in the Windows Vista Unattend.xml file http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929831
INTRODUCTION
You can use the FolderLocations settings in the "Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup" area of the Windows Vista Unattend.xml file to move the user profiles folder or the program data folder to a non-default target location. The user profiles folder is typically %systemdrive%\Users. The program data folder is typically %systemdrive%\ProgramData.

This article describes known issues with the FolderLocations settings in the Unattend.xml file.
MORE INFORMATION
The target location for the user profiles and program data folders can be on a volume other than the system drive as long as the volume meets the following requirements:
It must be an NTFS file system volume.
It must not be the path of another operating system user profile folder or program data folder.
It must not contain any serviceable components.
These unattend settings have the following known issues:

If you use the FolderLocations unattend settings to move user data or program data to a location other than the %systemdrive% folder, you block upgrades to other versions of Windows Vista or to later releases of Microsoft Windows.

If you use the System Preparation Tool (Sysprep) to apply the FolderLocations unattend settings, some system directory junctions do not point to the new target location. The following system directory junctions continue to point to the old locations:

C:\Documents and Settings continues to point to C:\Users.

C:\ProgramData\Desktop continues to point to C:\Users\Public\Desktop.

C:\ProgramData\Documents continues to point to C:\Users\Public\Documents.

C:\ProgramData\Favorites continues to point to C:\Users\Public\Favorites.

If you use the Windows Vista Setup program to apply the FolderLocations unattend settings, the system directory junctions do not point to the new target location. The following system directory junctions continue to point to the old locations:

C:\Documents and Settings continues to point to C:\Users.

C:\Users\Default User continues to point to C:\Users\Default.

C:\Users\All Users continues to point to C:\ProgramData.


If you use the System Preparation Tool to apply the ProfilesDirectory unattend settings, the user profiles of domain users who have previously logged on to the computer are left in the old location. The public profile is also left in the old location.


The EdBott.com blog advice doesn't really re-locate the user folder. It only relocates some of the user subfolders (Documents, Music, etc.) It doesn't work for the hidden user subfolders (like AppData) at all. And it doesn't move the root folder for the user, so if you click on the username on the Start menu, you're still taken to the C:\users\username folder.
The same goes for cutting and pasting user subfolders, I believe, as was mentioned in an eariler post.
So far, it looks like the registry change is the way to go. BTW, here is the microsoft KB article that documents that registry hack:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/236621

XP RESOLUTION http://support.microsoft.com/kb/236621
To specify a different folder for the "Documents and Settings" folder during installation, follow these steps:
1. Use the /UNATTEND switch with Winnt.exe or Winnt32.exe and insert the following entry into the Unattend.txt file, where z:\foldername is the path and folder name you want:
[GuiUNattended]
ProfilesDir = z:\foldername
2. Install Windows. The path you included in the Unattend.txt file is used instead of the default "Documents and Settings" folder.

To specify a different folder for the "Documents and Settings" folder after you install Windows for a particular user, follow these steps:
1. Identify the user's profile path. There are two methods to identify the profile path. Either by user path settings or user SID. The user SID method is preferred.

User SID method
a. Use the GETSID tool from the Windows Server Resource Kit to obtain the SID. Use syntax similar to the following example:
GETSID \\SERVER1 UserName \\SERVER1 UserName
b. Once you obtain the SID, use Regedit.exe or Regedt32.exe to select the user's SID under the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList

User path setting
a. Log on to the computer as the user, and then type SET at a command prompt. Note the setting for USERPROFILE, and then close the command prompt window.
b. Log on as an administrator of the computer.
c.
Use Registry Editor to add the USERPROFILE setting to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList
d. Click the registry key, and then click Find on the Edit menu.
e. In the Find box, type the value of the USERPROFILE setting, and then click Find Next.

2. Change the ProfileImagePath value to use the new path you want in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList registry key.
3. Close Registry Editor, and then log on as the user. Type SET at the command prompt to verify the path has changed.
Entire Folder
NOTE: This method relocates key Windows components. Use this method only if you require the "Documents and Settings" folder to be moved or renamed and you cannot use the Unattend.txt file to change the name during installation.


To specify a different folder for the entire "Documents and Settings" folder, including key system components, follow these steps:
1. Log on to the computer as an administrator.
2. Create a new folder.
3. Open the current "Documents and Settings" folder.
4. On the Tools menu, click Folder Options, and then click the View tab.
5. Under Advanced settings click Show hidden files and folders, and then click to clear the Hide file extensions for known file types and Hide protected operating system files check boxes.
6. Click OK.
7. Click and drag to copy all the folders to the new folder, except for the currently logged on users folder.
8. In Control Panel, double-click System, and then click the User Profiles tab.
9. Copy the current user's profile to the new folder.
10. Click OK, close Control Panel, and then log off and log on to the computer as an administrator again.
11. In Registry Editor, click Find on the Edit menu.
12. Type documents and settings, and then click Find.
13. Replace the value data or rename the value or registry key to the new path for each and every registry key and value that contains the original path.NOTE: You must complete this change for every instance in the registry or your computer may not start. It is imperative that you update all registry keys and values with the new path.
14. Restart the computer.
15. You can now safely remove the original "Documents and Settings" folder.
Note If you search the registry for "Documents and Settings," you will find a string value in the following subkey: HKLM\system\controlset001\control\hivelist. This string value is \Device\HarddiskVolume#\Documents and Settings. Do not change this string value. After you finish searching for "Documents and Settings," also search for the short file name "Docume~1." Change the path for those results.
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Posted April 7, 2007 Comments(36)
Here lies my experience moving my entire User Profile folder structure, including Default, Public, and any local users.
In my search for a solution, the only two easy ways I found to move the user profile directory locations from the system drive is to
1. Set the User Profile folder during setup using an unattended install file.
2. Move the individual folders inside your user profile, which can be done using explorer (which will update the registry keys HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curre ntVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders and HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curre ntVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders).
However, this was not good enough for me, I wanted my actual user profile folder to be moved to a seperate partition/volume, including registry settings. I discovered that it is not actually that hard, provided you’re comfortable with mass replacing registry keys and values.
Here is how I moved my user profile location. Please note that I wanted all of the profiles moved, included Public and Default, so some of these steps can be skipped if you do not want that:
1. Make sure you have a complete backup of your system!
2. Copy the original Default Profile directory to the new location (e.g. from C:\Users\Default to D:\Users\Default).
3. Copy the original Public Profile directory to the new location (e.g. from C:\Users\Public to D:\Users\Public).
4. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList.
5. Change the value of the Default key to the new user profile location (e.g. D:\Users\Default).
6. Change the value of the Public key to the new user profile location (e.g. D:\Users\Public).
7. Change the value of the ProfilesDirectory to the new user profile location (e.g. D:\Users).
8. At this point, you need to restart and log back in as a different user that has never logged in before and therefore does not have a profile created. In my case, the Administrator user had never logged in before so I enabled it so that Administrator could log in and used that. You can enable Administrator login by loading Computer Management and then go to User Accounts, edit the properties for Administrator, and then uncheck Disable Login.
9. After logging in for the first time with the new user account, you will see “Creating Desktop” and other things like that while Windows is creating your profile. Note that the new profile should be created in the new location.
10. After logging in, try to close as many applications as possible. This will prevent most files from being locked so that you cannot copy them.
11. Copy the entire original user profiles folder from the original location to the new location (e.g. C:\Users\* to D:\Users\). (See next step after copy starts).
12. There are a few things to note during this copy. There were thousands of .TMP files that were locked and would not copy. I just skipped these files. I held down Alt-S so that I could see all of the skipped files and make sure that there were only .TMP files being skipped. Yes, this took a little while, but at least I was confident that I got all of my files copied. This process could probably be made easier using the command prompt or powershell.
13. If, in your case, there are some files that will not copy, you can run procexp.exe, which is file provided by sysinternals. Then do a Find Handle and search for part of the filename. procexp will tell you which programs are locking the file. As long as you closed as many programs as you could, though, this should not happen.
14. Find and download a program that will do a Search & Replace on the registry. I will not suggest one because I did not find one single program that worked perfectly. I ended up downloading a few different freeware applications and using all of them.
15. Using the Registry Search & Replace program, do a search for the original user profile folder and replace it with the new user profile folder (e.g. search for “C:\Users” and replace with “D:\Users”. Note that some of the applications I used would only change values and not key names. However, the keys that needed to be changed were all related to MuiCache. I do not know if these actually need to be updated. I did just to make sure.
16. Log out. Log back in with the same user. Repeat step 14 until there is nothing left to replace. The reason for this step is that on logout, some programs seem to update the registry using the old user profile path.
17. Run regedit.exe and do a search for the original user profile path and make sure it does not exist. The reason for this step is because (as noted in step 13), I did not trust any of the Registry Search & Replace programs I used. I ended up needing to update about a dozen of the keys and values manually, since the search & replace missed them.
18. So that you can easily find programs that do not use the registry and hard-coded profile paths, rename your original profile folder (e.g. rename C:\Users to C:\~Users).
19. Log out. Log back in as your usual user. Everything should be working correctly except for programs that use a “hardcoded” user profile location.
20. There are two easy methods that can be used to find programs that use a “hardcoded” profile location and are still looking for the original user profile path. You can use the procexp.exe trick mentioned above and search for handles in the original profile location. You can also monitor the oringal profile location to see if any new folders or files were created. For example, in my case, FolderShare created some folders and files in the directory C:\Users\MyUsername\AppData\Local\FolderShare\. So, I updated the FolderShare settings to point to the different path and then deleted the C:\Users directory (note that C:\~Users still existed as a backup).
21. Since you are now confident that all of your data has been moved (right??????), you can deleted the backup of the original user profile location (e.g. C:\~Users).

This procedure worked flawlessly for me. Everything user-related is now on a completely different volume, and I can sleep a little better at night!

[Scatterlogical]

Hmmm, all sounds too hard guys :P. I have a simpler solution, easy to set up, works flawlessly so far (although I'm not sure about that upgrade problem, but I'd think it's easy enough to resolve when set up this way), and the solution would have been staring you in the face, since all the legacy user paths are dealt with this way... Just create a directory junction/mount point!

I did it using a mount point; you create a new partition to hold the profiles, copy the whole contents of c:\users onto the partition, then reboot off the vista CD. Go to repair>command prompt, then from there you rename c:\users to something like c:\oldusers, create a new empty dir c:\users, then use MOUNTVOL to mount the partition to it. Or you could create a new directory junction to the path of your choice (although, correct me if I'm wrong, but I do believe a junction has to link to a location on the same volume, otherwise mount the vol).

Now you can reboot and voila! Vista doesn't seem to know the difference, all your paths are intact and your user profiles are on another volume, so you can trash vista and reinstall (or clone a backup image, whatever) with ease whenever you need to. Actually, I believe there's other advantages too - shadow copies will be segregated between system and users volumes, plus I'm thinking it may even have a performance advantage since it will reduce system-wide fragmentation and provide smaller, more specific search indexes etc. I'm just about to make an extra partition to do the same for my program files too; so system, apps and users are contained in their own domains.

So you're not relying on the hope that changing the users path explicitly (in the registry etc.) is going to affect everything - for all intensive purposes, the path is still the same, the show keeps rolling, and your system is none the wiser!

If you want to try this out, be sure you know what you're doing (yeah I haven't gone into every little specific detail, but if you can't fill the gaps then best don't try this), and make backups first etc. (not that I practice what I preach, but anyway...). Of course it's your responsibility if you bugger it up, I'm not offering any guarantees, just good advice and good luck with it!

[PigLover]

OK, I got the idea of mounting the volume on top of users. Sounds like it should work great.

One question: what happens when the disk you are using for 'users' fails? You don't have anyplace left to have an administrator log in and fix it, do you? Is Vista just hung and you are SOL or is there a graceful way to deal with this?

I really want to do this - it will solve a HUGE problem for me - but I've been burned in the past when a disk failed. The whole idea is to make the system more resilient and I am worried about creating a new complication.

Thoughts?

For me I hadn't planned to relocate the programs folder. My plan is to build the main drive to be as compact and fast as possible. I have samples of 32G Intel X25-Es (the single-level enterprise class SSDs) that I was going to put together into a 64Gb raid-0 for performance. Then run Users on a pair of 750Gb Seagate's running in a raid-1 for reliability. This way response on the 'programs' file and OS will be faster than life. Since the OS and programs don't change too much I'll just take and image weekly onto a normal bootable drive, which I think I can even completely automate with Ghost (I prefer Acronis over Ghost for backups but Ghost will at least automate an image onto a bare drive). Seems perfectly safe AND fast. Just need to remember to relocate the pagefile so that you don't to too many writes onto the SSDs.

I still worry though - how will Vista behave if the mount point fails. I think I might actually leave 'users' where it is, including having an admin user built and left there, and then just mount the one user directory with any files in it (mine).

[agent86oz]

Sorry if I am a bit slow but I don't understand everything written here too well but ready to learn.

I have previously just dragged each users folder to a second D: hard drive, I think the Favourites and Contacts folders have issues.

I downloaded your software and did a scan and even though the shell folders have been moved it does not show anything on drive D:

I have read the help but still feel out of my depth.

What I basically want is to move users folders to the Data drive and all new users to turn up in the Data drive

I don’t know how to use Junction Link Magic to do this.

I have copied all the shell folders from Drive C to Drive D for user Ian but your software does not show that when I do a scan.

I believe the most common request by far is people want to run an application after windows install an application that takes all user shell folders and place them on an alternate drive and create that as default for new users added. They would also like this to have existing user content on the C: drive moved to the data drive at the same time.

Failing that a step by step procedure would be great.

1 procedure for an individual user and 1 procedure for setting for global new users created.

I appreciate your time will be valuable and this is volunteer work but I for one would happily pay $20 + for an application that did this with some sort of walk through wizard or even just did it all without any explanation.

Thanks for your time and without your forum post I would not be aware of this.

I was also interested in your indexing question but wouldn't you just index the drive the folders were the data exists, that is what I do currently.

Thanks

Ok that all sounds over my head. The drag shell folders to drive D seems to works for what I do. I image all drives with Acronis True Image. I have Windows home server for backing up all computers overnight and file duplicaiton on for critical data and offsite backup using Jungle disk for important stuff. The only time I have lost data several times is when I messed with different OS on the first drive. Since moving to a second or third drive for data I have never lost data only OS issues with multi boot and Acronis fixes that fast. All my mistakes occure after 1am in the early hours and it has been a big day and you accidently click delete on something automatically without thinking :-)

I still think there is a market for someone to do the shell folders thing though as it is widely discussed. I might also look at the registry settings some people are using.

I was just wanting to do it right as I have 3 new computers and thought there must be a better way, I am fussy like that.

Thanks for your prompt reply.

Hello everyone,
Its 18 months later. I invented the first method to move Vista's users
folder of the C: Drive. Got alot of email from it.

Until I discovered Scatterlogical's idea, not much work had been done
including myself.
Scatterlogical your solution is very inventive. But may be good for NTFS
Volumes only. I will have to test it. I do not like NTFS. I try to use FAT32
when possible. The new ExFAT looks promising.
To what extent have you tested your method ?
Does this not leave the original folder in tact taking up space ?
Scatterlogical Please contact me

Hmmm, all sounds too hard guys :P. I have a simpler solution, easy to set
up, works flawlessly so far (although I'm not sure about that upgrade
problem, but I'd think it's easy enough to resolve when set up this way), and
the solution would have been staring you in the face, since all the legacy
user paths are dealt with this way... Just create a directory junction/mount
point!

I did it using a mount point; you create a new partition to hold the
profiles, copy the whole contents of c:\users onto the partition, then reboot
off the vista CD. Go to repair>command prompt, then from there you rename
c:\users to something like c:\oldusers, create a new empty dir c:\users, then
use MOUNTVOL to mount the partition to it. Or you could create a new
directory junction to the path of your choice (although, correct me if I'm
wrong, but I do believe a junction has to link to a location on the same
volume, otherwise mount the vol).

Now you can reboot and voila! Vista doesn't seem to know the difference,
all your paths are intact and your user profiles are on another volume, so
you can trash vista and reinstall (or clone a backup image, whatever) with
ease whenever you need to. Actually, I believe there's other advantages too -
shadow copies will be segregated between system and users volumes, plus I'm
thinking it may even have a performance advantage since it will reduce
system-wide fragmentation and provide smaller, more specific search indexes
etc. I'm just about to make an extra partition to do the same for my program
files too; so system, apps and users are contained in their own domains.

So you're not relying on the hope that changing the users path explicitly
(in the registry etc.) is going to affect everything - for all intensive
purposes, the path is still the same, the show keeps rolling, and your system
is none the wiser! )

Piglover, (what a name)

You make good point. What does happen if your ?:/users drive fails. If
it fails during an OS secession then your computer functionality will
diminish but you should not crash, as data is retained in memory. Open
programs will need to be saved elsewhere. restart will not likely happen.
If your are rebooting and your ?:/users drive failed you problaly will
not boot ot boot to a blank windows screen.
In either case as long as you are dual booting and have made a backup copy
of ?:/users YOU ARE NOT SOL or screwed.

Currentaly I am going with new equipment quad processors and all 64bit
OS's in a penta-boot (thats five OS's) Also messing with RAID 1+0.

[SoNotHollywood]

can't we just do a reboot , go to the command prompt and do this....

robocopy C:\Users D:\Users /E /COPYALL /XJ
rmdir /S /Q C:\Users
rmdir "C:\Documents and Settings"
mklink /J C:\Users D:\Users
mklink /J "C:\Documents and Settings" D:\Users

isn't mklink a lot better and safer that using the mount?
==========================
* Robocopy options:
/E
copy subdirectories, including Empty ones.

/XJ
eXclude Junction points. (normally included by default). Never exclude this

/COPYALL
COPY ALL file info

**rmdir options

/S
Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself. Used to remove a directory tree.
/Q
Quiet mode, do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with /S

***mklink options

/J
Creates a Directory Junction.

i will be honest with you this was my last straw with windows vista, i didnt get a chance to test and see if this would have worked in the long term so i have no answer....

I installed the pre release of windows 7 and been using that over one month now, my brother also did the same on a older laptop he had,

we both agree its a amazing operating system, seems like a faster tuned up xp, made me forget about all my vista nightmares,

sorry i couldn't answer your question :-)

[mzfasmh]

I like your solution but I wonder if you have found any problems with it since you first posted it. For example, do updates works OK? and do any programs fail because they are 'hard-wired' to C:\Users?

Yes, I went down exactly the same route - I gave up on Vista after two years of struggling. But of course the same questions apply to Windows 7 - have you tried to move Users in Windows 7?

I agree that so far Windows 7 looks as though it's everything that Vista ought to have been. Still, it's early days yet and there may be flaws that have yet to minifest themselves, but it's looking good.

Still want to get user files off C: though!

You should keep a file on a second, save machine what, when and how you
changed. If every new user should be on D, then the users folder should
point to D, with mountvol or a Junction Point. Think of it as a tunnel.
Vista gets the data through it without knowing it went to the other
side. If that fails somehow, your system is broken and you will need
some commandline skills to fix it. Or a new installation.

Vistas indexing doesn't reach through the tunnel. I don't get results
searching in c:\users\account (which is the second top folder in the
data explorer), only in D:\account (which I need to mark under
Computer). But when I click c:\users\account, I see D:\account.
Otherwise one would have multiple results for one file, seen through
multiple Junction Points.

[benze]

Sorry for pointing back to an old thread, but am having a miserable time here trying to move Vista/Win7 profiles.

In XP, it was quite simple. Move the entire Docs & Settings folder to another drive, create a junction pointing c:\docs & settings to the new drive and you were done. Relatively easy stuff (a few intermediate steps left out for brievity).

Now in Vista, I can use almost the same hack, with the one exception that when I move the Users folder to a seperate drive, none of the OS junctions contained within the profiles are moved as well. I have tried to recreate them by hand, but can't seem to get the right combination of ACLs and attributes to make them exist exactly as they were prior to the move.

After recreating the junctions, they do not get hidden when "Hide Operating System Files" is enabled. THe original profile junctions do not have the system or hidden attributes set, and yet they are still hidden.

Does anyone know how I can recreate these profiles (including junctions!) on another drive?

Ok, this is an old thread. But still as I have used this method with XP and
now with 7 (don't know about vista) I have some experience with "failing". I
started this, because defragging (back then defragging maybe really had an
effect ;-) ) took a very long time for the whole drive (had cygwin installed,
which has tons of small files). And I also thought it would have performance
advantages and I btw. liked it, how most Linux distros did this by default.

So I first moved cygwin to it's own partition and mounted it back to the
original location (this was easy because all open references could be closed
while running windows).

Then I moved the whole apps folder to another partition. This was a little
bit harder, because I had to "kill" some programs/drivers that were always
accessing their folder. cygwin was still on it's own partition mounted in a
mounted folder ;-)

Some time later when the hd got full, I started by moving the "my documents"
folder ("Eigene Dateien" in the German version I use) just by using setting
another path. Which of course broke some programs (and the file history of
every program) because they still tried to use the path from install time.

So I took the hard step to mount a partition in the original place. I used
backup and restore to copy the whole "document and settings" folders contents
to another temp folder and changed all the ProfileList path variables in the
registry to the new value (they want be used until a reboot). After a reboot
I could move the contents of "documents and settings" to an empty partition.
Now that this folder would be empty, i could mount this partition back to
"document and settings". Back to the registry changing back the path values,
then a reboot and all was done!

Now for the failing: somehow it happend 3 times that the partition would get
unmounted (always after uninstalling some programs, which had older
uninstallers). I don't know how XP would even allow this. This should not be
able to happen, Microsoft!! In more than 10 years using Linux I never had a
problem with partitions.

Nevertheless it is noticeable immediately because e. g. the desktop is empty
or the start menu doesn't work anymore, although it took me nearly half an
hour to figure out what the problem was the first time it happend. I even did
a reboot and could log in but was greeted with many errors of nonexisting
files/folders aso. If this is the case you can't mount back the partition,
because windows will already have created files that are in use in the now
real "documents and settings" folder.

The solution: assign a drive letter do the partition (it's a good idea to
keep it in addition to the mount point) and change the profile path values in
the registry to reflect the change. Reboot (everything should look normal
already), empty the "documents and settings" directory and mount back the
partition to it. Change the path values back and reboot.

So: yes, you can log in and as most admin tools are in the windows directory
you can even repair it without rescue disk. Again, it shouldn't happen!

The files on another partition has already come in handy when adding a new
hd for space. Just leave the system on the old drive (as long as the new disk
isn't much faster) and mount a new disk in place of the old one. No hassle
with new path values and completely transparent to all programs. By the way
that's one reasons why Linux does it that way. So Microsoft *hint* *hint*,
how about leaving DOS-age drive letters behind? They are not needed anymore.

Btw. I did the same on win7. Unfortunately it didn't get any easier as
Microsoft decided to crosslink/hardlink/whatever many directories (show all
hidden files and see the mess!), but it is still possible.

A system on a 1TB bulk hd is slow. Holiday videos and a music collection on
a SSD is a waste. So, Microsoft - yes, talking to you again - how about
making it easier for everyone and giving this option at install time, like
every Linux distro does? (you are used to copying, so why not start copying
some useful things ;-) )