Bit of a stupid thing Ive done, when installing

ash_scotland88 · 11 Sep 2008 at 20:10

Bit of a stupid thing Ive done....

basically when ive been installing applicatiosn rather than just deleting "c" and changing to "e" Ive been selecting the E drive from the drop-down box.
Now my e-drive is a mess of folders and files, Ive tried uninstalling some programmes that i know link with certain files but this still hasnt removed them.
Will reformatting that partition be safe?

I understand sometimes even if you install on "e" it can still install compenants on "c"...so yeah is it actually safe to reformat the partition or can poeple think of a way round it? apart from living with the mess?

(in other words instead of something like c/program files/applicationx it basically just turned in e/)

edit: beofore i unistalled a couple, i moved all the stuff into a folder, this ofcourse has messed up the running of things....atleast the ones i tried.

edit2: would installing everything then formatting, then reinstalling work?

edit 3: ok, other i installed onto the same place, and moved in the program mess file appear to work, may have just been that one.

Major_Disaster · 11 Sep 2008 at 23:55

Youve got me confused. Where is Windows installed? What are you / do you want to use C and E for?

bledd · 12 Sep 2008 at 08:58

information is the key.

1> how many drives were connected when you installed windows?
2> what comes up when you type %systemroot% into a run box?
3> what comes up when you type %programfiles% into a run box?

it's impossible to answer until you've told us that

Jumping · 12 Sep 2008 at 12:05

Wow that is one confusing post. No wonder you drives are confused too

SimonCHere · 12 Sep 2008 at 12:35

Yes, some programs will install stuff onto your windows partition (c in your case) so even if you do reformat your e drive it wont get everything.
You have to use the Add remove programs in control pannel it may not get everything, settings and such, but, other than nuking it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

As you've already been messing with moving the program's files around. You have pretty much limited yourself to removing all the programs you have installed to the e drive, using add/remove programs, and then trashing(formatting) the e drive.

Next time it asks you where to install it, just change the c: to e: and leave the rest of the path as it is!

Simon