Moving user profiles ( recovery from it)

sargan said:

I had moved my W7 user profile as per the tutorial here ...
User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation


While it was easy to follow and it worked fine for several months came across a HUGE issue with that procedure, my OS had an issue and I needed to run windows repair - and found it will not work with profiles moved. So had to end up with a clean install (many hrs of fun)

If you had browsed the tutorial thread a bit, or at least posted your issue there, you had found out or I had told you that the whole process is easily reversible. It's quite a simple procedure to reverse the process, move Users folder back to C:, do the repair or upgrade install, then move Users back to another drive.

sargan said:

So after re-install as the key thing was to free up space ... I followed this process instead:
Don't move your Windows user profiles folder to another drive | ZDNet

Which just moves the mydata folders, not the user profile.

That article is infamous, discussed a few times in the tutorial thread and other areas of the Seven Forums. You can even find my response to it in article comments, as well as many others pointing out how invalid and old information the article contains. It is based for a Microsoft support article for pre-release Windows Vista from nearly 10 years ago. The "facts" told in that article are no longer valid when we speak about Windows 7.

sargan said:

There is one issue I have .....It is to do with file associations ...
If I take for example and mpeg file ... if it is on C drive and I double click it, it opens fine with the player VLC (set in Ctl Panel > default programs > set associations)

If the file is on the drive where I moved the 'my video, my documents etc to' .. i.e D:\ it does not open ... just pop up error of "This file does not have a programme associated with it ....."
If I right_click and use 'open with' it will run OK
If I move file to C:\ it runs by double clicking fine.

Is there a known issue here ?
Is there a way of forcing associations to be same across both HDD ?

I am sorry but as I have only ever used the Sysprep method, I do not know this and am not able to answer you. Let's hope you get response from other members.

Kari

sargan said:

I did see the part in article about being reversible ....... but that is not the case ......... when I tried the reversal with much (grateful) input from users here, no amount of work could get it to the point that Windows repair would run. ...

for example : Can't move user profiles

KARI - You were one of the ones involved in trying to resolve, along with others - but it could not be made good - hence the clean install.

Anyway we are past that, and the new install took place, and I am certainly not going to move profile again, W7 does not support it ... and I need ability to be able to run repair or upgrades should I need to.

So all I have moved id 'user data' which is bulk of the HDD space so that works OK.

NO, NO, NO!!!

Please read this carefully:

In your original post in this thread you mentioned my tutorial User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation. That process is totally reversible, easily and fast. Going through your posts you have never, not a single time asked help in doing a repair or upgrade install on a system where the Users folder was relocated using the Sysprep method told in my tutorial you referred to.

This quote is from the post #1 in this thread, tutorial title you mentioned highlighted:

sargan said:

I had moved my W7 user profile as per the tutorial here ...
User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation

The older thread of yours where you asked help, you never mentioned that you had used the Sysprep method from my tutorial, that's why I could of course not give you the correct advice. In that older thread of yours you mentioned you had used a totally different method, tutorial title highlighted, :

sargan said:

Guys ... opening this as separate thread as previous one took a direction of its own.

Scenario
As per Tutorial moved my profiles off the C:\
User Profile - Change Default Location

In order to use Windows Repair/Upgrade Disk I need to move them back.

We gave you wrong advice because you gave us wrong information. This is your own fault. How on earth I or other members trying to help you could have guessed that the method you said you had used was in fact not the real method you had used? In that old thread of yours we were trying to help you to reverse the method you told us you had used but which you had in fact not used.

Of course that didn't work; reversing the move, moving back the users needs to be done in the same way the move was originally made.

Thanks for clearing this up. The method you mentioned in post#1 in this post and the method you claimed you had used in the older thread of yours really are two different methods. One cannot be reversed using the other method.

I repeat what I told you in my previous post, adding some to it: had you used the method in my tutorial, the method you mentioned in your original post in this thread, and had you come to ask assistance, I had told you the simple procedure and helped you to go through it.

I now know why our assistance and instruction in your old thread did not work, you gave us wrong information about the method you had used to relocate the Users folder.

Over and out,

Kari

In addition to what I have posted previously, here's an interesting fact:

Checking the tutorial thread you mentioned in your original post (User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation), all of its 909 posts, you have not posted a single post there. See it yourself, here's the complete list of members who have posted in that thread: https://www.sevenforums.com/misc.php?...osted&t=124198

You have not asked how it's done, nor have you asked how to reverse it in order to be able to do a repair or upgrade install.

You have however started two threads asking how to reverse a completely different method of moving user profiles.

sargan said:

I followed the original tutorial on how to move profile (not sysprep method) ... that is all past now 6 months have passed.
The Q remains the same, does anyone else know how to get the file association on D:\ work ?

For me "the Q" does not remain the same. Let me explain why this is important to me:

The Sysprep method I explain in my tutorial you mention in your original post, claiming that you have used it although that is not true and then telling it caused big problems, it might affect other users, other members reading this thread by creating a negative opinion about the method without a reason.

The Sysprep method is the only fully functional no issues method to move the complete Users folder to another drive, yet when you used another not so fully functional method and got issues, you in this thread claimed them to be caused by the method from my tutorial:

sargan said:

I had moved my W7 user profile as per the tutorial here ...
User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation

While it was easy to follow and it worked fine for several months came across a HUGE issue with that procedure, my OS had an issue and I needed to run windows repair - and found it will not work with profiles moved. So had to end up with a clean install (many hrs of fun)

I am a quite proud geek and I do not write a tut if it is even remotely possible it would cause HUGE issues, and I take all this quite seriously. When an issue is reported, I always use as much time as needed to either find a solution or give up and warn readers of the tut about the risks. See this tut of mine and its big red warning box at our sister site the Ten Forums for an example what I mean, a fair warning when something might cause issues or does not work as expected: https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/...e-sysprep.html

To put this short, call it vanity if you'd like to but it is important to me to make this very clear: Your issues, past and present, were not caused by the Sysprep method told in my tutorial you referred to, claiming to have used it which we now know was not true.

No reason to argue, you just mentioned in your fist post you had used the Sysprep method, your later posts revealed that was not the case.

About your issue now, I really do not know how to solve it. I have always used the Sysprep method and it does never have such an issue. I really hope some other members find this thread and can assist you.