Installing programs on a different drive question

Hi, whilst you can choose the location where UWP apps exist, the space used, unless perhaps you have some large games, say, will tend to be small.

Move Apps to another Drive in Windows 10

Now consider traditional desktop programs which you download and install and use exe and dll files. Many - but not all- of these allow you to specify where these are to be installed.

Do not make the mistake of then thinking that means 100% of that program is installed there. In most cases it isn't. Most programs created and use folders in various places on your system drive.

One possible exception might be large games, but what %ge of the game would end up being placed on the HDD depends on the design of that particular game.

A far better use of your HDD is as a data drive. Plan to separate your data from "C: " and place it on your HDD.
Why? If you need to clean install the O/S, your personal data is then unaffected. Of course, you won't be able to do a 100% perfect job. Consider e.g. browser favourites- that needs special planning. What about your desktop? You might have some things there- best not to have much. Then you might want to consider emails if you use an email client.

I suggest you do not use the Location tab to move Documents, Videos etc- rather create your own folders on the HDD- you can then include them in the relevant libraries if you wish. (It's all too easy to make horrible mistakes when using the Location tab).

I wouldn't do it. If you have to ask, then it's not the sort of thing you should try to manipulate at this stage. Plenty of threads in multiple web site from users that have tried this, only to end in tears.

In any case, one the main purpose/advantage of an SSD is the extra speed and ease with which it handles loading, running and unloading software. It it's there, use it.

But by all means, re-direct/move personal data to the HDD to maximise the amount of space available for software on the SSD. You can do this by either permanently redirection/moving the folders to the HDD, or setup up a method of moving the contents to the HDD every so often.

graywoulf said:

I know that my entire OS is on the SSD and I want to keep that drive as clear of any other data that I can. I just don't want to fill it up with my other software programs if at all possible. Thanks for your advice as well.

Your OS would be lucky if it takes up 40GB. On a 250GB SSD, that's negligible. Plenty of room for other software.

@ graywoulf Same as one of my new HP computers.

This I just found on the Dell Community website...

Windows 10 Pro - installing programs on second hard drive

Windows 10 gives you the option of installing programs on another drive. In "All Settings/System/Storage/Change where new content is saved" there are options to save new apps, new documents, new music, new photos, new movies, and offline maps to a location other than C: drive.

graywoulf said:

That might be true for most people but my older laptop has a 500GB HD in it and it is almost full. I will say though that considering that is 12 years of use and pictures and other junk that needs to be cleaned out, I still will have way more than 250GB of graphics, editing and many different related software packages to install over time.

You seem to be missing the whole point of the above suggestions.

That's the primary reason why it's been suggested above that *ALL* personal data (documents, pictures, videos, music, etc) be moved to/stored on the HDD. If you have the luxury of 2 drives (which you do) none of this (documents, pictures, videos, music, etc) belongs on the SSD with the OS and programs.

It would be a waste of a valuable (SSD) resource to install other programs on the HDD and then keep storing personal data on the SSD ????