Is changing the location of the "My Documents" folder bad? Can it mess anything up?

[jonesad]

Hello,
I recently built my new rig, and I now have a raptor HDD which is 74 gigs. In an effort to conserve space on it (I install a lot of games), I was thinking of moving the target of the "My Documents" folder. I have currently about 10 gigs worth of files in "My Documents" and I want to move it to one of my storage drives. Anyway, I was wondering if moving the target of My Docs can cause anything screwy in windows? All my Sims 2 save games are in there, as well as all my MP3's. Will changing this mapping cause itunes or musicmatch to act werid? Kind of a sill question, but I wanna hear from others beofre I try.

 

[Dahak]

Dont know about moving it after, but i have moved it just after i have formatted and have not had any problems with it on a different location. I cant really see any problem unless the game or app is hardcoded to the location rather than using system variables

 

[montag451]

as long as you do it within xp [system variables], no problems.

on the other hand, you can use any folder you want, and name it whatever you want. only prob is that some apps will default to saving stuff in my documents.

 

[jonesad]

That was my concern, that I didn't do it right away and certain programs have now mapped things to that location. I just wasn't sure if they use a variable or if they hard code the path. Guess I'll try it tonight and see. Hopefully won't break anything to bad.

 

[imported_Twitch]

I would personally move the My Documents folder onto a different HDD than what Windows itself is being run from (if possible).. just in case something destroyed your OS, having your data nice and safe is a nice thing.

A lot of your information will still be kept on the Windows partition (Look at C:/Documents and Settings/Your User Name) and My Documents is just one dir in there. (favourites, cookies, etc)

 

[bovinda]

I just want to second Twitch's idea of locating My Documents on a separate hard drive. That's saved my butt at least three times already when viruses and/or other malware I couldn't handle screwed up my operating system.

 

[KoolDrew]

If you moved it by right clicking, going to properties and choosing Move then no it will not cause any problems. If you just move it manually then yets it would. I myself actually move it to a seperate partition when I install my OS so I have some stuff on there I do not want to lose if I reinstall the OS, like saved games etc.

 

[Blazer]

i leave mine as it is and use the copy and paste method to have a copy of MY DOCUMENTS on another HD,but i also image my C: drive with ghost to anoyher HD. = no failure or loss

 

[oog]

i changed some registry settings to move my documents and i haven't found any problems.