Windows 7 - Help. Windows 7 default user in recovery drive? Can't figure this out

Hello

I installed windows 7 on my dell desktop a few days ago. I meet the system requirements. I purchased the copy of windows 7 from my school Digital Union so I'm pretty sure it's an OEM (did not come in retail package etc)

I've been having this problem:

I have two user accounts. One is in my C drive and the other is in my recovery D drive. I'm pretty sure my default user is the D drive, but this drive is only about 15 GB and is filling up fast.

I've tried to change the path of programs that I download through the registry but that doesn't completely work. I've also attempted to copy files based on the tutorial Brink posted on this forum but that doesn't work when I try to install things either, stuff still defaults to the D drive sometimes. It's like my active user account is the D drive and I can't do anything to switch it.

I know the D drive is for backup.

I've watched the tutorial whs made on creating seperate partitions but still do not quite understand how that will help me.

I'm very confused and need help. Please excuse my naivete. I am in a total state of confusion. Have spent about 5 hours between yesterday and today researching and trying to figure it out.

Any help would be invaluable.

Hello Jwheels, welcome to Seven Forums!





Just to get started; the D: Recovery is more than likely a partition that was added at the factory by Dell and was not intended to be used for anything, it's original purpose was to contain the image used to recover the PC from "issues" back to the original factory state and also used to create the set of recovery disks used for the same purpose.

It would be a very good idea to move any data on that partition to the main C:, the "Move To" part listed in the tutorial at the link below can be used for that purpose to great effect.
We'll stop here for now as I'm sure that's enough for the time being; have you any questions?


Context Menu - Add Copy To Folder and Move To Folder

Hey, thanks for replying Bare Foot Kid!

So let me understand this just a bit before I look through the tutorial and try it out:

Did I accidentally install Windows 7 on my D drive placed as a recovery partition by Dell? I originally had Windows Vista installed from the factory.

No, I don't believe so as 15GB is not enough to install Windows 7 to; do this.

In the Windows start menu type "disk management" and post a snip/screen-shot of the complete drive map of your disk management so we can see what you have going on (like this).


How to Post a Screenshot in Seven Forums



click to enlarge

Here is the screenshot of my disk partitions

Thanks for your help so far, BFK

OK, here you are:

1. when you still had Vista, your C partition was the Vista OS and your D partition was the Vista recovery partition. That is how the OEMs set it up.
2. now you seem to have installed your Windows 7 on D - but your Windows 7 MBR is probably on C - so you ended up with a mix-up
3. when you install Windows 7 from and OEM disk, you should end up with one partition provided you start with a clean disk

4. Here is what I suggest:

a) make an image of your Vista partition for the case you ever want your Vista back. Use this program. If you think you never want your Vista back, you can skip that.
b) Cleanup your whole disk (delete all 3 partitions) and reformat (quick format) the disk with this program. Define the whole disk as one partition (that way you avoid the 100MB boot partition at installation time). Burn the bootable CD (see left pane on the webpage). Then it is easy to do.
c) reinstall your Windows 7 in that partition.

Note: I did not recommend to image and reload your current Windows 7 because I suspect some mixup with the MBR.

PS: If you need more help with my other tutorial, send me a PM.

Hello Wolfgang, have you seen the snip of disk management above?

I would suggest you get all the date off of the D: partition you want to keep to the C: and then you can go from there.

BFK, yes I saw the snip. I conclude that he somehow got Windows 7 on D and the MBR is on C because it is active. It would be easy to check in msconfig > Boot tab if he has 2 Operating systems. But maybe I am wrong.

Hello Jwheels, let us see the boot at msconfig.