Getting Back to C:\ - the LONG way

[TDHeller]

Like the title says Back to C:\ in a long winded way.

My problem is this
- I no longer have C:\ drive
- But E:\ is now doing all of the operations of C: - including program installations.

I have already tried Disk Manager reassignment - Here no C option exists to convert to.

Also tried the Registry Edit Option "System\Mounted Devices \DOS Device\ E to C with the
singularly curious effect of BOTH OS Desktops showing up as one at boot (Windows Loaded)
Icons from Each displayed simultaneously. - So I Returned to original Registry here.

Next - back to the old faithful reinstalling clean Windows.
After the uninstall format(?) Re-install with all other drives disconnected,
No C:\ is available - still offers only E:\ as my boot drive in BIOS and OS.

Curiously NOW any thumb drive or external device shows up as C:\ retaining E: as the Primary drive.
I gave up on this trying to live with it for a few days but it is driving me nuts trying to open C:\ and finding NOTHING.

Circumstances leading up to this are -New Build from ground up
- Added Crucial SSD as C:\ and Moved OCZ SSD to O:\ as a retrieval drive for any programs I may be able to drag and drop into new c:\.

Upgrade install to win-10 with an immediate wipe and reinstall to Win7-64 - I believe this may be where the
problem began. Though the win-7 install went pretty much without a hitch

The build consists of
-ASUS Z-170 MK-1 MOBO with latest 3007 AMI Bios with chip-set update
- INTEL i7 6700K (Not Clocked)
- 16 GB CORSAIR LPX DDR4
- Gigabyte 1060-6GB video card
The aforementioned
-E:\-500GB Crucial SSD
-D:\- New LG M-disk Blue Ray burner.
** Other drives are **
-O:\ OCZ 160GB SSD (Former C
-(D) now F:\-500GB WD Black SATA - Main storage for now
- L:\ -WD Passport 1TB USB-3 and one - Main Backup store now
- M:\ -WD Passport 4TB USB-3. New storage drive largely empty
- X:\ Seagate 160 SATA - Backup drive Old Backup drive
-powered by ANTEC 850W P/S (racing stripe yellow)

I sincerely hate to wipe and reinstall windows (from Thumb) yet again and find no change as before, but absent any other ideas I may be forced to it.

The core question now is what is the most sane and effective way to proceed? And where did I get sideways?

Considering I have 4TB of open disk for backup I am less concerned with this if it is the best alternative.
Are there any other tricks I may have missed?
- Searching Online I find this isn't an uncommon problem, when upgrading an OS and HDD - though the solutions I've seen are much more straightforward..
Thanks in advance...

 

[samuria]

Welcome to the forum when you reinstalled did you delete all partitions? If you didnt it would have kept the e: setting you need to remove all partitions leave it with none then install with the one drive best way is to use diskpart and type clean all

 

[TDHeller]

OK Samuria - Was hoping to avoid all the reinstallations but I hope a good backup will cover me...Thanks