Microsoft's obsession with the C: drive?

I did a clean install of beta2.

i have xpp installed on c: drive.

vista on the second partition of my primary drive.

during setup i partitioned and formatted the D: partition. expecting vista
to be installed to the D drive.

but after setup vista is on a c: partition. and it shows XPP on D: and i
think you can't change the drive letters of a system or boot partition.

if I boot into XP it is on the c: and it shows vista on E:

hope this is will be resolved before RTM.

no biggie, but it would be nice if I could keep the same drive letters for
the same partitions\drives in different OS's.

or even better if you had the option to select a drive letter for each drive
including CD\ DVD devices during Windows setup

i.e.

HDD0 Partition0 = C:
DVD = D:
HDD0 Partition1 = V:
DVD-RW = W:
HDD1 Partition 0 = X:



I don't need to hear that this is by design, or to use 3rd party
partitioning software...

What is Microsoft's obsession with the C: drive?

The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
booted into. The drive you see as C: from within XP may appear with a
different letter from within Vista. This is normal and not harmful.

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:EF119D05-FED6-42A9-AB94-C6797B990825@microsoft.com...

>I did a clean install of beta2.
>
> i have xpp installed on c: drive.
>
> vista on the second partition of my primary drive.
>
> during setup i partitioned and formatted the D: partition. expecting vista
> to be installed to the D drive.
>
> but after setup vista is on a c: partition. and it shows XPP on D: and i
> think you can't change the drive letters of a system or boot partition.
>
> if I boot into XP it is on the c: and it shows vista on E:
>
> hope this is will be resolved before RTM.
>
> no biggie, but it would be nice if I could keep the same drive letters for
> the same partitions\drives in different OS's.
>
> or even better if you had the option to select a drive letter for each
> drive
> including CD\ DVD devices during Windows setup
>
> i.e.
>
> HDD0 Partition0 = C:
> DVD = D:
> HDD0 Partition1 = V:
> DVD-RW = W:
> HDD1 Partition 0 = X:
>
>
>
> I don't need to hear that this is by design, or to use 3rd party
> partitioning software...
>
> What is Microsoft's obsession with the C: drive?
>
>

the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.

"The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
booted into."
- uhhh, I was performing a CLEAN INSTALL, the operating system I
booted into was the Vista installation CD, vista setup listed my XP
partition as the C drive. I partitioned and formated and started the install
on what vista setup detected as the D drive.

But the Vista install is calling the second partition on my primary drive
the C drive.
When the primary partition is the "REAL" C drive.

This is NOT Normal, this is new with VISTA.

Dual booting with XP does not produce the same results. XP gets installed to
the drive letter you select during a clean install.

Not harmful, but it is confusing.

"Colin Barnhorst" wrote:

> The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
> booted into. The drive you see as C: from within XP may appear with a
> different letter from within Vista. This is normal and not harmful.
>
> "troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:EF119D05-FED6-42A9-AB94-C6797B990825@microsoft.com...

>
>
>

During the install of Vista, the installer doesn't see it as the "D:" drive.
It sees it as a partition. You're just going to have to live with it, or
not use Vista.

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

> the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
> during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.
>
> "The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
> booted into."
> - uhhh, I was performing a CLEAN INSTALL, the operating system I
> booted into was the Vista installation CD, vista setup listed my XP
> partition as the C drive. I partitioned and formated and started the
> install
> on what vista setup detected as the D drive.
>
> But the Vista install is calling the second partition on my primary drive
> the C drive.
> When the primary partition is the "REAL" C drive.
>
> This is NOT Normal, this is new with VISTA.
>
> Dual booting with XP does not produce the same results. XP gets installed
> to
> the drive letter you select during a clean install.
>
> Not harmful, but it is confusing.
>
> "Colin Barnhorst" wrote:
>

It will install on the partition you select but it will determine drive
letters for the machine independently of the selection made by XP when it
was installed.

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

> the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
> during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.
>
> "The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
> booted into."
> - uhhh, I was performing a CLEAN INSTALL, the operating system I
> booted into was the Vista installation CD, vista setup listed my XP
> partition as the C drive. I partitioned and formated and started the
> install
> on what vista setup detected as the D drive.
>
> But the Vista install is calling the second partition on my primary drive
> the C drive.
> When the primary partition is the "REAL" C drive.
>
> This is NOT Normal, this is new with VISTA.
>
> Dual booting with XP does not produce the same results. XP gets installed
> to
> the drive letter you select during a clean install.
>
> Not harmful, but it is confusing.
>
> "Colin Barnhorst" wrote:
>

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

> the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
> during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.
>
> "The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
> booted into."
> - uhhh, I was performing a CLEAN INSTALL, the operating system I
> booted into was the Vista installation CD, vista setup listed my XP
> partition as the C drive. I partitioned and formated and started the
> install
> on what vista setup detected as the D drive.
>
> But the Vista install is calling the second partition on my primary drive
> the C drive.
> When the primary partition is the "REAL" C drive.
>
> This is NOT Normal, this is new with VISTA.
>
> Dual booting with XP does not produce the same results. XP gets installed
> to
> the drive letter you select during a clean install.
>
> Not harmful, but it is confusing.
>
> "Colin Barnhorst" wrote:
>

This is because Vista is installed on a primary partition and only one
primary partition can be bootable (active) at a given instance. The booted
primary partition "will" be the C: drive.

Live with it.

--

Regards,

Richard Urban
MVP Windows Shell/User
(using Vista 5384.4)

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew half as much as you think you know,
You would realize you don't know what you thought you knew.

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

> the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
> during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.
>
> "The drive letters are assigned from the point of view of the OS you have
> booted into."
> - uhhh, I was performing a CLEAN INSTALL, the operating system I
> booted into was the Vista installation CD, vista setup listed my XP
> partition as the C drive. I partitioned and formated and started the
> install
> on what vista setup detected as the D drive.
>
> But the Vista install is calling the second partition on my primary drive
> the C drive.
> When the primary partition is the "REAL" C drive.
>
> This is NOT Normal, this is new with VISTA.

It has always been this way.

If you install to a Primary partition, then that partition will be C: when
booted. If you install to an extended partition, then the drive letters
will remain the same.

For example, I have 2 physical drives in my machine. My XP install is on
the first logical drive of the extended partition of the first drive, so it
is seen as drive E:. When booted into XP, the Vista partition - the first
primary of the 2nd drive - is seen as D:. When booted into Vista, it's
partition is seen as C:. XP is still seen as E;, but the C and D drive s
are switched.

Primaries get assigned letters first, then secondaries. The booted Primary
partition is always C: However, booted logical/extended do *not* become
C:, so my example above of XP is always on Drive E:, even when XP is booted.

Mike

Richard Urban wrote:

> "troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

>
> This is because Vista is installed on a primary partition and only one
> primary partition can be bootable (active) at a given instance. The
> booted primary partition "will" be the C: drive.
>

No, Richard, that's not what Troma said or did. I've encountered
exactly the same "phenomenom," for want of a better word.

Like Troma, I dual-boot between WinXP and Vista (64-bit versions of
both, not that it matters, in this case). I have one physical hard
drive in the PC, divided into one Primary partition and one Extended
partition containing two logical drives. WinXPx64 has been installed on
the Primary Active partition for over a year. WinXPx64 has always, as
expected, listed this partition as C:, with the letters D: and E:
assigned to the two logical drives in the Extended partition.

When I installed Vista64, I deliberately created a dual-boot by
directing Vista64 to be installed on the first logical drive in the
Extended partition (WinXPx64's D: drive). In planning the dual-boot, I
had created and named the volume labels of the various partitions to
ease identification during the installation of Vista64. The Primary
active (bootable) partition, a.k.a. "C:," was labeled "WinXPx64," the
first logical drive of the Extended partition, a.k.a. "D:," was labeled
"Vista64B2," and the remaining logical drive, a.k.a. "E:," was labeled
"Data." All went well with the installation, and I'm dual-booting using
Vista's native boot manager.

When I boot into WinXPx64, the drive letters and volume labels remain
as they were created, and as one would have expected, based on all
earlier multi-boot scenarios using Microsoft's native boot loader.

However, when I boot into Vista, both Windows Explorer and the Disk
Manager report the C: drive to be the volume (a logical drive in an
Extended partition, remember) labeled "Vista64B2" and the D: drive to be
the volume (the only Primary Active partition on the hard drive) labeled
"WinXPx64." The drive letter for the "Data" volume remained unchanged.
Only Vista's Boot Configuration files are on the Primary Active partition.

This (relabeling the partition containing the OS as "C:," rather than
"hard-coding" C: to the Primary Active partition) is new behavior for a
Microsoft OS. And, as Troma says, it's a harmless feature, but it is
initially confusing to those of us who have habitually multi-boot
Microsoft operating systems for many years.


--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:
http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. -Benjamin Franklin

"troma" <troma@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:6F4AC9DB-366E-4AD4-9FFF-0B740A7D8D88@microsoft.com...

> the point i was trying to get across was that if I select the D partition
> during setup windows should install to the Drive i select.

Yes, it was installed to partition you pointed
If you want to keep the same drive letter assigning you must run setup from
current WinXP installation.

--
éÇÏÒØ ìÅÊËÏ (Igor Leyko) MS MVP Windows - Shell/User
ipigl@redline.ru

Oops! Sorry about the incorrect time. (-:

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User
(For email, remove the obvious from my address)

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"Richard Urban" <richardurbanREMOVETHIS@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:uCucZLYjGHA.4040@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...

> Strange!
>
> I installed Vista on a primary DOS partition (the 3rd partition on drive
> 0). When I boot into Vista, it "is" drive C:
>
> The primary partition that Windows XP is on is tagged as "inactive" - and
> is not seen by the Vista operating system except within disk management.
>
> Of course, I am using a 3rd party boot manager program. I never allow any
> Microsoft service to act as my boot manager. I like total control and
> Microsoft just does not give me that.
>
> --
> Regards,
>
> Richard Urban
> Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User
> (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
>
> Quote from George Ankner:
> If you knew as much as you think you know,
> You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!
>
> "Bruce Chambers" <bchambers@cable0ne.n3t> wrote in message
> news:uo1MOxXjGHA.1324@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

>
>