Change drive letters from command line via a script

Sorry for the delay in responding.
Tried the above commands on a fresh Windows install. Get-Partition returns nothing prior to running the command and nothing after commands and a reboot.

Code:

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19044.3570]
(c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Windows\system32>sc config winmgmt start= disabled
[SC] ChangeServiceConfig SUCCESS

C:\Windows\system32>net stop winmgmt
The following services are dependent on the Windows Management Instrumentation service.
Stopping the Windows Management Instrumentation service will also stop these services.

   Intel(R) Dynamic Application Loader Host Interface Service
   IP Helper

Do you want to continue this operation? (Y/N) [N]: y

The Intel(R) Dynamic Application Loader Host Interface Service service was stopped successfully.

The IP Helper service is stopping.
The IP Helper service was stopped successfully.

The Windows Management Instrumentation service is stopping.
The Windows Management Instrumentation service was stopped successfully.


C:\Windows\system32>Winmgmt /salvagerepository %windir%\System32\wbem
WMI repository is consistent

C:\Windows\system32>Winmgmt /resetrepository %windir%\
WMI repository has been reset

C:\Windows\system32>sc config winmgmt start= auto
[SC] ChangeServiceConfig SUCCESS

C:\Windows\system32>

[Reboot]

Windows PowerShell
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Try the new cross-platform PowerShell https://aka.ms/pscore6

PS C:\Users\Joel>get-partition
PS C:\Users\Joel>

Could this be a driver issue? Does this system use RAID mode (but not necessarily RAID)?

System uses AHCI mode.

All drivers (chipset, audio, LAN) are current. I do not use wireless or BT even if motherboard supports it. All PCs are either 2.5G or 10G LAN. There are no exotic devices installed, just boot SSD and a spinner.

Before doing above test I wiped system and reinstalled from scratch. I have not yet installed any applications on that PC.

The PCs I tried have X299 and Z790 motherboards.

I've just added powershell 7.4.0 and the storage cmds don't work in that version either

I feel filthy about piping commands thru diskpart...

ChangeDrive.bat

Code:

<# : batch script
@echo off
powershell -nop Invoke-Expression ('$OldDrive = """"%1""""; $NewDrive = """"%2""""' + [System.IO.File]::ReadAllText('%~f0'))
goto :eof
#>

$Volume = @{}

foreach ($line in ("list vol" | diskpart | where { $_ -match 'Volume' })) {
    if ($line -match "Volume ([0-9]+)[\s]+([A-Z]) " -eq $true) {
        $Volume.Add($Matches[2], $Matches[1])
    }
}

if (-not ($Volume.ContainsKey($OldDrive))) {
    "{0}: is not assigned." -f $OldDrive
    exit
}

if ($Volume.ContainsKey($NewDrive)) {
    "{0}: is unavailable." -f $NewDrive
    exit
}

try {
    "select volume $($Volume[$OldDrive])`nassign letter=$($NewDrive)" | diskpart | Out-Null
    "Changed {0}: to {1}:" -f $OldDrive, $NewDrive
}
catch {
    $_.Exception.Message
    exit 1
}

That seems to work. Need to do some more extensive testing though.

I have a batch script I run on every PC which automates the configuration for each PC. This drive letter setup has been a PITA for years, thank you for your help.

I imagine I would call this script repetitively from my main script.

Code:

call chgdrive J A
call chgdrive I B
call chgdrive H I 
etc

The main script writes output to a log file (I do not want to see results on screen), which is set as a variable %logfile%

Code:

chgdrive J A >>%logfile% 2>&1

I imagine this would not work. How do I write the output from your script to the log file?

Code:

rshell -nop Invoke-Expression ('$OldDrive = """"%1""""; $NewDrive = """"%2"""" ; $logfile = """"%3""""' + [System.IO.File]::ReadAllText('%~f0'))

But what goes after

Code:

"{0}: is not assigned." -f $OldDrive
"{0}: is unavailable." -f $NewDrive
"Changed {0}: to {1}:" -f $OldDrive, $NewDrive

To append the results to the log file?

Why wouldn't it work?

Code:

C:\Users\GARLIN\Downloads>set logfile=log.txt

C:\Users\GARLIN\Downloads>ChangeDrive.bat Z E >>%logfile% 2>&1

C:\Users\GARLIN\Downloads>more log.txt
Changed e: to z:
Changed Z: to E:

I don't know.
Anyway, you're right it works.

And so does adding >>$logfile to your script.

This is going to save me heaps of time. Thanks for your help.

A major flaw in my logic.
As Windows assigns drive letters to optical and removable drives last, these are the drives that need to be changed.
Problem is you can't run a script from a drive and change the drive letter. It causes the script to crash

So, on this system my optical drive is assigned I: and my drive with my scripts is H:
So when I run
chgdrive I A - that's fine
chgdrive H I - Kills the executing script because H: is no longer found.

Another issue is that the script sets up lots of variable at the start

set src=%cd:~0,2%
set srcpath=%src%\Postinstall\%USERNAME%
and many others

These will be recorded as H: and H:\Postinstall\Joel as this is what the drive letter was at the start of the script.

Any way around that?