How do I fix this?

zbalat

Platinum Member
Oct 9, 1999
2,501
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When doing a fresh install of WINXP Home I accidentally booted from the CD ROM instead of the HDD as the install was finishing up. Essentially I installed XP over itself. Now I have a folder named "C" on my C drive. The contents of the "C" folder is exactly the same as the Windows folder on the C drive. Windows works fine but the "C" folder and the Windows folder are almost 1GB each. I'd like to get the disk space back.

Windows will not let me uninstall\delete the "C" folder because it is in use. What to do?

Thanks in advance.

 

mee987

Senior member
Jan 23, 2002
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<< Windows will not let me uninstall\delete the "C" folder because it is in use >>


perhaps the working installation is in the "c" folder and the old installation is in the "windows" folder. try deleting the "windows" folder
 

microAmp

Diamond Member
Jul 5, 2000
5,988
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<< Seems like the easiest thing to do would be to fdisk and start over. >>



Will have to agree on that one.
 

crisp82

Golden Member
Apr 8, 2002
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If u don't wanna start again, just delete the 'c' folder, if it gives an error message such as 'Windows cannot delte this folder as it is used by Windows to run' or something like that, try deleting the other one.
 

zbalat

Platinum Member
Oct 9, 1999
2,501
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Deleting the windows folder actually worked. My windows folder is now named "C" but everything is working great. Thanks Guys (mee987 in particular).
 

Workin'

Diamond Member
Jan 10, 2000
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<< My windows folder is now named "C" but everything is working great. >>

I couldn't live with that, who knows what problems you might encounter as you add more software to your machine that expects windows to be in the right place. It may be no problem at all, but there would always be that nagging doubt every time something went wrong... and it's a helluva lot easier to reinstall Windows before you tweak it out just the way you want it.
 

mee987

Senior member
Jan 23, 2002
773
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<< who knows what problems you might encounter as you add more software to your machine that expects windows to be in the right place >>


you will be fine, windows is not that stupid.
 

Workin'

Diamond Member
Jan 10, 2000
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<< you will be fine, windows is not that stupid. >>

Windows might not be that stupid but plenty of non-MS applications are! All I'm saying is that now is the time to fix it up, before you spend all your time installing additional software and getting everything else set up the way you like it, only to find out that something will not work. But it doesn't really matter to me what you do, I'm not the one who will have to fix it.
 

zbalat

Platinum Member
Oct 9, 1999
2,501
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I reinstalled windows. Now every folder is named properly. Thanks for the info Workin'.

 

mee987

Senior member
Jan 23, 2002
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what im saying is that windows applications that use the windows folder do not just use a static pointer to the location "c:\windows". if you install something on an NT system, the apps will automatically use "WINNT" instead. ive had several systems with the folder at d:\windows, and that is where the programs refer to.

you can have your windows folder wherever you want it and it will be fine.