WIN98 looking for files in drive D not C [Solved] \ VOGONS

WIN98 looking for files in drive D not C [Solved]

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First post, by that1crzywhtguy

Posted on 2018-09-21, 06:17

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So I've got a sort of weird one here, and I'm really scratching my head. I've looked everywhere, and I just can seem to find an answer.

Once upon I time, windows was indeed installed on drive D, but that was many in place reinstalls ago, many hardware changes ago. Mostly, everything works stellar, but I have found this little issue. If I right click a file and select "open with," I notice notepad's icon is gone. If I try to select notepad, it tells me it can't find it, saying it's looking in "d:\windows\notepad."

This tells me there is probably some registry setting somewhere that's telling it some things are still on D. Anyone know where this setting is? How I might edit/restore it?

If it's just this little quirk, fine, not a huge deal, but I'm wondering if this points to other things somewhere being configured incorrectly. Is there a blanket way for me to tell the system everything is now in C?

Thanks in advance.

Last edited by that1crzywhtguy on 2018-09-22, 04:59. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 7, by dr_st

Posted on 2018-09-21, 07:35

dr_st Offline

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Is the problem just with notepad, or all the built-in Windows applications?

Check C:\MSDOS.SYS and make sure that WinDir, WinBootDir and HostWinBootDrv are set correctly under [Paths] at the top of the file.

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Reply 2 of 7, by that1crzywhtguy

Posted on 2018-09-21, 09:04

that1crzywhtguy Offline

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dr_st wrote:
Is the problem just with notepad, or all the built-in Windows applications?

Check C:\MSDOS.SYS and make sure that WinDir, WinBootDir and HostWinBootDrv are set correctly under [Paths] at the top of the file.

Wordpad seems to work okay, so as far as I can tell it's just notepad. Since I posted, I did another in place reinstall, and it's still having the issue.

WinDir, WinBootDir and HostWinBootDrv are all set correctly.

Funny that you mention checking that file, because trying to use "open with" and selecting notepad to open msdos.sys is exactly what I was doing when I discovered the issue.

😀

Reply 3 of 7, by dr_st

Posted on 2018-09-21, 10:19

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Try this:

Explorer --> View --> Folder Options --> File Types
Select "Text Document" or any other file for which Notepad is the default program.
Edit --> In "Actions" listbox choose "open" --> Edit
The full path of the application should appear in the window that pops up. Could it by chance point to the wrong location for Notepad.exe?

Also:

Open up a command prompt from inside Windows, and type SET. Check all environment variables - PATH and others. Do they all point to the correct C:\WINDOWS location?

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Reply 4 of 7, by that1crzywhtguy

Posted on 2018-09-21, 17:42

that1crzywhtguy Offline

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dr_st wrote:
Try this: Explorer --> View --> Folder Options --> File Types Select "Text Document" or any other file for which Notepad is the […]
Show full quote
Try this:
Explorer --> View --> Folder Options --> File Types
Select "Text Document" or any other file for which Notepad is the default program.
Edit --> In "Actions" listbox choose "open" --> Edit
The full path of the application should appear in the window that pops up. Could it by chance point to the wrong location for Notepad.exe?

It points to the correct location.

dr_st wrote:

Open up a command prompt from inside Windows, and type SET. Check all environment variables - PATH and others. Do they all point to the correct C:\WINDOWS location?

Also correct locations.

Weird, right?

Reply 5 of 7, by dr_st

Posted on 2018-09-21, 18:14

dr_st Offline

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Weird.

Well, the next thing I'd suggest is searching the registry for any appearances of D:\WINDOWS, to spot any possible redirects / leftovers.

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Reply 6 of 7, by that1crzywhtguy

Posted on 2018-09-21, 20:43

that1crzywhtguy Offline

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dr_st wrote:
Weird.

Well, the next thing I'd suggest is searching the registry for any appearances of D:\WINDOWS, to spot any possible redirects / leftovers.

Oh man, search the registry! Why didn't I think of that.

Gonna check that when I'm home.

I imagine if I find enteries, I can just edit them to c:\windows, right?

Reply 7 of 7, by that1crzywhtguy

Posted on 2018-09-22, 04:59

that1crzywhtguy Offline

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Took a while, and it was definitely tedious, but I used the find function in regedit to track down every entry pointing to "D:\" and edited them all to "C:\"

All fixed now! Thanks for the help. 😀

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