Can't install a plug-in because my main drive isn't C:

Feb 7, 2008
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My original hard drive got messed up so i had to get a new one and install windows again. this time, it installed as I: and not C:. I have a program that I installed an add-on for and it doesn't seem to want to work and I think it's because it's not in the C: drive since, for whatever reason, the C: drive is now a flash card reader. Is there any way to change this without causing a huge problem with all the programs I have installed on the new hard drive? I've tried to manually place the add-on but it really doesn't seem to have a way to do that...
anyway, it's for ZBrush and the addon is http://www.pixologic.com/zbrush/features/GoZBrush/

I looked through all the help docs and couldn't get it to work.
 

postmortemIA

Diamond Member
Jul 11, 2006
7,721
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you can't change drive letter of partition where windows is installed... you can make something else be C: in your case, since windows is not on it, but it can't be you installation
btw perhaps plug-in tries to write to C: drive, so if you instert card in card reader, it might work
 

RadiclDreamer

Diamond Member
Aug 8, 2004
8,622
40
91
Try using the subst command

C:\subst /?
Associates a path with a drive letter.

SUBST [drive1: [drive2:]path]
SUBST drive1: /D

drive1: Specifies a virtual drive to which you want to assign a path.
[drive2:]path Specifies a physical drive and path you want to assign to
a virtual drive.
/D Deletes a substituted (virtual) drive.

Type SUBST with no parameters to display a list of current virtual drives.


This will allow you to map your I: to a "virtual" C:
 

Mark R

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
8,513
16
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Contact the manufacturer of the plugin and ask that they fix their broken software.

An installer that assumes your windows installation is on C is fatally defective.

As this appears to be a commercial software package, the least their tech support should be able to do is sort out the installation for you.
 
Feb 7, 2008
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yeah i thought it was completely ridiculous that they don't have a way to manually select the drive through the program itself..it just has a button to automatically find it. i've installed it on a friend's computer (with the default c:) and it works fine.
i'll try that subst thing when i get home..i may just end up buying a new SSD drive since i've been meaning to upgrade for a while. i'm hoping if i do a new install of windows it will sort out the problem i had with the drive name.
 

ZeroRift

Member
Apr 13, 2005
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You can change the drive letter for windows, but I don't recommend trying as it will also break every file association related to your I: drive.

I once had windows installed to F: and eventually ran into the same problems you have with poorly written software. In my case, I was able to map a partition to C:, install the application, copy the files out of the directories that were created on C: into the proper / equivalent directories on F: and all was well. In your case, there may also be registry changes involved depending on the application....

In short: rebuilding the OS on C: is probably your best bet if you can't just copy the files where they need to go.