How to move User folders to 2nd drive in Windows 8?

Anonymous
2012-11-12T16:38:04+00:00

I am posting on behalf of a customer.

His C drive's a SSD & which is not big enough for all his music,photos,video and download files. Is there a way to move user files to a second drive?

Please comment with any information or suggestions.

Thank you.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Files, folders, and storage

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-04-15T17:37:58+00:00

    Simply UNACCEPTABLE that you cannot move the entire USERS directory to another drive. Not only is this method inefficient because you have to do this for every single user (not a global way) but you are actually suggesting that most of the space users in the USERS Directory are located in those folders that are relocatable (My Documents, My Pictures, etc).

    We are in 2013, where many people buy those expensive and space limited SSDs in order to get windows to boot faster and other applications to run faster. My entire USERS directory has 19 gigs of stuff in it and most of it, 90%, is located OUTSIDE of the folders you are offering to relocate.. Its been years now that people requested a way to move what is now known as the Users directory since Windows 7...

    The only way to do this properly is through the SYSPREP method. However, if you create a restore point or upgrade your windows from lets say 8.0 to 8.1, you cannot use it anymore! I am one of these people who, had his USERS folder relocated on another HDD with Windows 8.0. I was forced to move them back to my C: drive because Windows 8.1 would not install, saying the USERS FOLDER was on another partition. HOW RIDICULOUS IS THAT??? Very poor engineering if you ask me.

    Get into the 21st century and actually FIX THIS PROBLEM and allow people to move their Users folder where they want. There are risks yes, some people might relocate their Users directory on an external USB drive that when removed would cause problem but this is simply something that you have to ALERT PEOPLE when they wish to move their USERS FOLDER.

    FIX THIS ASAP!!!

    I have posted similar requests for control over where %users% is located. The early versions of Windows allowed a SUBSTITUTE path so It is pathetic that user files and folders cannot be globally redirected to an alternate location for Windows 7 & 8. This is a REQUIRED feature during the OS install and later on for advanced users.

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-03-21T17:04:52+00:00

    This turned out to be a total disaster.  I did as the instructions said and moved the My Documents folder location to the D drive.  However, I did not know that this actually made the entire D drive the my documents folder.  Now I cannot move to an actual my documents folder on D because you cannot move a parent to a child and I also cannot restore the default.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-12-12T20:12:04+00:00

    I just did this for my downloads folder and moved it to me E drive but now i want to undo this i tried going into properties and tried restore default option in location but i get the following error " Failed to build the list of regular subdirectories under "E:\System Volume Information". Access is denied. 

    so what should i do please advise.

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  4. Anonymous
    2014-12-09T21:01:07+00:00

    the Answer of Vijin V is the only possible. MS does not permit to move the entire Users folder. Change OS if you want it

    http://www.zdnet.com/article/dont-move-your-windows-user-profiles-folder-to-another-drive/

    Caution

    Using this setting to redirect folders to a drive other than the system volume blocks upgrades. Using ProfilesDirectory to point to a directory that is not the system volume will block SKU upgrades and upgrades to future versions of Windows. ... The servicing stack does not handle cross-volume transactions, and it blocks upgrades. [emphasis added]

    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc722177(v=WS.10).aspx

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