Windows 7 - Drive letters...

After a recent HDD failure, my manufacturer sent me a new one, as my warranty is still valid. After I purchased the full version of Windows 7 Professional, I burned it onto a disk, and booted my computer from the CD rom drive. It's only an 80 GB hard drive, but I had 4 partitions. 1. (EISA Config), 2. (C:-Windows XP Professional) 3. (E:-Empty, reserved for Windows 7), 4. (DellRestore).. after I booted from the CD ROM drive with my windows 7 installation disk inserted, I was asked which partition I would like to install 7 on. I chose E:, because it's the partition I was reserving for it. After installing windows 7, I realize my C: (Windows XP Pro) drive has been bumped to D:, and my CD-ROM drive is now E:, and Windows 7 is on C:. I'm aware that this can cause problems when trying to install software or games from a disk, so I'd like to know how to fix it. Also, I should note, all of my Shortcuts which were in C:, which changed to D:, are now non-working, as they refer to a C: directory. Any advice in these matters would be appreciated. Thanks..

~TA

You should not face any issues in installing softwares. Earlier when I installed Window 7, its was on C drive. When I installed Windows XP as dual boot, it gained H drive letter. So whenever I install any software on XP, it directly goes into H:\Program Files.

You can change the drive letter by clicking Start and in the Start search box, type diskmgmt.msc and press enter. Right click the drive which you would like to change the drive letter and choose the available letter.
However, changing Drive letters can cause serious problems to either of the OS and may stop booting.

Hello TheAnonymity,

Whatever OS you boot to will show as the C: drive by default. It cannot be changed.

I'm not sure what shortcuts from where you are referring to. You cannot use shortcuts to run programs from the XP partition in Windows 7 if that is what you are trying to do though. If you have installed the programs in Windows 7, then they should be pointed to the C: drive as well. If, not then you may need to change the shortcut's properties target location, or reinstall the program.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

Appreciated. Also, how safe would it be to just entirely delete my XP partition, and expand my 7 partition?

Since XP was installed first and most likely is the boot partition, you would have to repair the Windows 7 MBR file after deleting XP. If the XP partition is to the left of the Windows 7 partition in Disk Management, then you would need to use a program like GParted instead to extend Windows 7 into the now "Unallocated Space" from the deleted XP partition.

Be sure to backup anything that you do not want to lose to be safe though.

Regarding your post, what I mean is:
When I boot onto XP, it shows the drive letter as D: still. All of my shortcuts in the XP partition are invalid because they refer to the C: partition, which my 7 installation is on.

This is a screenshot of my Disk Management..

You might see if only creating new shortcuts for each program directly from the program's exe file may work. If not, then you will need to reinstall each program in XP.


If you still wanted to delete the XP partition, you can. You will need to right click on the Windows 7 partition in Disk Management first, and mark it as "Active". Afterwards, you can delete the XP partiton, and use a program like Gparted to extend the Windows 7 partition into the now unallocated space.

I have Acronis Disk Director Suite. Will that work for expanding?

It should.