Move Users Folder Location in Windows 10

Kari · 24 Feb 2019

spudnz said:

Your tutorial is very simple so I think I got that right.
Using your process 1 I got the file moved fine but I had a strange windows error where I couldn't access my defender. No one could help me there.

What kind of issue you got with Defender? it sounds strange, and it don't have to have anything to do with folder relocation.

spudnz · 24 Feb 2019

I would get a popup window, "you need a new app to open this". It made access to security settings impossible. Yes it had nothing to do with your moving user folder process. But the error would only go away if I didn't attempt the move users folder during install. Anyway I have since bought a new larger M.2 SSD (successful standard install) and I'll forgo moving my users folder. The SSD will just wear more than I wanted.
Thanks for your help and input during my 3 days of reinstalls and problems.

johngalt · 25 Feb 2019

spudnz said:

I would get a popup window, "you need a new app to open this". It made access to security settings impossible. Yes it had nothing to do with your moving user folder process. But the error would only go away if I didn't attempt the move users folder during install. Anyway I have since bought a new larger M.2 SSD (successful standard install) and I'll forgo moving my users folder. The SSD will just wear more than I wanted.
Thanks for your help and input during my 3 days of reinstalls and problems.

Which version of Windows 10 are you installing, and is it (perchance) a modified version, or did you grab the .ISO from M$ site?

Like you, I've used Kari's tutorial starting from the Win7 days, and as he stated (and I did recently for another user), I only had problems when I created them myself.

I recently performed, again, the same procedure via a self-made USB installer for Windows 10 Insider Preview build 18329 (I think it was, maybe 18334), and again had 0 issues. And I've certainly never even heard of an issue with Defender, which makes this all the more odd, and thus has piqued my curiosity...

Michael833 · 26 Feb 2019

Hello everyone,

Great forum here. I've been reading it for a week solid as I try to solve a problem that I just can't seem to shake.

I was happily running what I thought was a legit copy of Win7x64 Ultimate. Turns out it isn't, but I had already installed the free Windows 10 Prox64 upgrade on another partition some time ago. However, I was still using the Win7 installation until just recently.

Now I'm trying to finish setting up my Win10 installation fully and make the switch permanent. Part of that process is taking the (mostly empty except for AppData) Users folders and move them to another partition on a second internal HD. I've been following the steps here, but when I run Sysprep, I get "A fatal error occurred while trying to sysprep the machine." I've googled around a bit but don't find anything that seems to match my problem.

The one thing I noticed was that the Method 2 video in the opening post has the

HTML Code:

<cpi:offlineImage cpi:source="wim:G:\sources\install.wim#Windows 10 Pro" xmlns:cpi="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:cpi" />

code that tells where the wim file is located. However, that bit of code is now missing from the text box for Method 1 step 2, and so are the corresponding instructions about modifying it. I've read through all the posts since late 2017 in this thread, but I didn't see anyone discussing that it disappeared, so I'm not really sure what to do. Could this bit of missing code be my problem, or is there some other issue? I have an installation CD that I made in my CD-drive, but I don't think it's being used for this operation based on the way the code is currently written. Also, there isn't an install.wim file on that CD, so I'm really not sure what to do about it.

Any help solving either of these problems would be greatly appreciated. Thanks all for your time.

Soapm · 28 Feb 2019

I would like to have my profiles drive;

D:\Alowicious
D:\Cinderella
D:\Expialadocious
D:\Mickey

Which is how I have them now by manually editing my XP Registry after install. That's the way I've always done it back to Win95 but it's a very time consuming thing to do wroth with pitfalls and potential catastrophic mines.
However, this method only seems to accept;

D:\Users\Alowicious
D:\Users\Cinderella
D:\Users\Expialadocious
D:\Users\Mickey

Any reason this shouldn't work?

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<unattend xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:unattend">
<settings pass="oobeSystem">
<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<FolderLocations>
<ProfilesDirectory>P:\</ProfilesDirectory>
</FolderLocations>
</component>
</settings>
</unattend>

Note I want to put my profiles P:\</ProfilesDirectory>

Wow, looks like I asked this exact question the last time I changed the drive in my laptop...

Move Users Folder Location in Windows 10 - Page 23 - | Tutorials

I wonder if the answer changed

Kari · 28 Feb 2019

Michael833 said:

Now I'm trying to finish setting up my Win10 installation fully and make the switch permanent. Part of that process is taking the (mostly empty except for AppData) Users folders and move them to another partition on a second internal HD. I've been following the steps here, but when I run Sysprep, I get "A fatal error occurred while trying to sysprep the machine." I've googled around a bit but don't find anything that seems to match my problem.

I guess you are trying Method Two, sysprepping an existing installation. warned in tutorial. It is not recommended, and often fails. Extract from warning posted in Method Two:

Relocating Users folder with Sysprep should only be done on new, clean installs! Trying this Method Two, relocating Users on an existing installation might force you to do a complete reinstall or restore your PC to factory state.

My recommendation is to start from scratch and do a clean install, Method One in this tutorial.

Michael833 said:

The one thing I noticed was that the Method 2 video in the opening post has the

HTML Code:

<cpi:offlineImage cpi:source="wim:G:\sources\install.wim#Windows 10 Pro" xmlns:cpi="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:cpi" />

code that tells where the wim file is located. However, that bit of code is now missing from the text box for Method 1 step 2, and so are the corresponding instructions about modifying it. I've read through all the posts since late 2017 in this thread, but I didn't see anyone discussing that it disappeared, so I'm not really sure what to do

It is often mentioned in this thread that although CPI Offlinesource line does no harm if present in answer file, it is completely unnecessary and can therefore be left out. That line is created when you create answer files in Windows System Image Manager just to record which Windows image was used to create the answer file.

Unnecessary line, does no harm if present.

Kari

Kari · 28 Feb 2019

Soapm said:

I would like to have my profiles drive;

D:\Alowicious
D:\Cinderella
D:\Expialadocious
D:\Mickey

You can't, at least when using Sysprep to relocate user profiles. The profile folder must be named Users, and it must be on root of the drive where profiles will be relocated.

Kari

Soapm · 28 Feb 2019

Kari said:

You can't, at least when using Sysprep to relocate user profiles. The profile folder must be named Users, and it must be on root of the drive where profiles will be relocated.

Kari

Thanks...

Second thought, will I have to move all the current profiles since their currently on the root and the new ones will be in the Users folder? I know it says to have no previous windows files but it seems they'll be in a different location???

Michael833 · 01 Mar 2019

Kari said:

I guess you are trying Method Two, sysprepping an existing installation. warned in tutorial. It is not recommended, and often fails.

My recommendation is to start from scratch and do a clean install, Method One in this tutorial.
Kari

Definitely noted. Sadly when I tried to do a fresh install, it asked me for a key which didn't work. And there was no option to skip as shown in the video. So I used my backup and got back to this (already installed) version with the User folder in a less-optimal location. Am I missing something that would allow me to bypass the need for a fresh key? The CD I created with Windows Media Creation Tool doesn't seem to be doing the trick. Is there some other way to create that CD (from inside Win10 as opposed to inside Win7, etc) that would allow me to bypass the need for the key on a system that already has Win 10 and is using the same hardware?

Or should I try to "Reset This PC"? I've read that this is like a fresh install (I have my files backed up elsewhere), but I'm not sure it will go as far as letting me get into Audit Mode as a fresh install would.

Soapm · 01 Mar 2019

This isn't working for me either, fyi... I have to use CTRL + SHFT + FN + F3 to get into audit mode. Just saying in case anyone runs into my same situation...

Anyway, I created the relocate.xml file and used my newly created H: drive for my user profiles. Nothing was on the partition which is what I mean by newly created, I used disk manager to create the partition and assign it the letter H:.

After the reboot it gets to where Cortona says, "Now let's see what's new". Then I get a screen that says, "Something went wrong" with an error in yellow that says, "OOBEEULA".

These results were consistent over three attempts, each time I got the same results. I finally loaded the OS without this step and it loaded just fine so there is something in this step that's causing the error.

This is my relocate file in case something's wrong with it...

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<unattend xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:unattend">
<settings pass="oobeSystem">
<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<FolderLocations>
<ProfilesDirectory>H:\Users\</ProfilesDirectory>
</FolderLocations>
</component>
</settings>
</unattend>