making an ext HDD a specific letter drive regardless of the computer

[SegaOutrun]

ive got an external HDD and I want to move my emulators on to it. I also want to make it portable so i can run it on any PC. The issue of course is all the folder paths will be different depending on what computer i plug it into because the Drive letter will change. Is there anyway I can make my ext hdd always show up as specific Drive letter (for example, a less common letter like N:/) or if not, a batch file that will change it on the drive letter once its plug in to avoid having to do it manually?

Thanks

[sollyscomputers]

Depending on your operating system but mostly all the same.

Make sure your USB device is plugged in

1.  Right click on 'My Computer'
2. Click on 'Manage'
3. Click 'Disk Management'
4. Right click on the drive you want to change the drive letter
5. Click 'Change drive letter and paths'
6. Click 'Change' button.
7. Select the drive letter you want (usually in the high end of alphabet) to assign to the drive
8. Click 'OK'
9. Click 'Yes' to confirm

You're done.  Every time you connect that device to that computer, it will have the same drive letter.

[SegaOutrun]

I am aware on how to do it manually but, im looking for a way to default it regardless of what computer i plug it into. or a bat file that basically does all those steps for me.

[JDFan]

I am aware on how to do it manually but, im looking for a way to default it regardless of what computer i plug it into. or a bat file that basically does all those steps for me.

Don't think you can since each system is going to have different letters already assigned and if the one you want is already assigned you would have to first change that drive to free up the letter you want (which could mess up that system and cause other problems) So trying to automatically do this could be more trouble than it is worth --- much easier to manually do each system the one time (so you can ensure there is not already a drive assigned that letter and decide whether it can safely be changed) -- How many systems do you plan on plugging the drive into ??

One method you could use would be to use redirection paths but that still would require a manual setup the first time on each system but at least avoids any problems with already assigned drive letters ( see starting bottom of page 1 "Permanent assignment basics" of this article : ( http://news.office-watch.com/t/n.aspx?a=659 ) for details

[Howard_Casto]

You could probably do it, but it'd have to be a crazy letter like Z because as JD mentioned, most of your common letters will be reserved.  In a modern pc C-J are usually already used by the hard drives, optical drives and multi-card reader. 

I guess you could also use A or B... it isn't like you are going to find a pc with a floppy on it anymore. 

[ed12]

i am still baffed ?
as to why.?
usb windows will see it as removable drive
internal sata/ide? windows will still see it
linux if command it will see it
i am baffed ?
it is all in the boot sector >mbr</>format<
the question still baff's me

ed

[EMDB]

USB Drive Letter Manager for Windows: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html

[Malenko]

i am still baffed ?

Its not about the drive being read, its about the drive letter not changing. He wants the Drive to always be the same letter, so he can set up batch files that will work on the machines he plugs it into.

[ed12]

oh thk u
i truly was confused

ed

[SegaOutrun]

thanks everyone but most of the solutions presented are for setting a specific letter to a specific computer. I was looking for a specific letter to any computer. I have my entire hyperspin on an ext hdd and want to let say go to a friends house, plug it in and play without anyone having to do any configurations. But most of the apps use paths for roms, plugin, etc so if on my computer my external hdd is D:/ and when i plug it into my friends computer and the ext hdd is now E:/, all the paths are now broken.

I guess the only solution is setting my paths to an uncommon letter (for ex. U:/) and when i put it into another computer, manually change the ext hdd to U:/. I was just hoping to skip this step or have it done automatically

[JDFan]

thanks everyone but most of the solutions presented are for setting a specific letter to a specific computer. I was looking for a specific letter to any computer. I have my entire hyperspin on an ext hdd and want to let say go to a friends house, plug it in and play without anyone having to do any configurations. But most of the apps use paths for roms, plugin, etc so if on my computer my external hdd is D:/ and when i plug it into my friends computer and the ext hdd is now E:/, all the paths are now broken.

I guess the only solution is setting my paths to an uncommon letter (for ex. U:/) and when i put it into another computer, manually change the ext hdd to U:/. I was just hoping to skip this step or have it done automatically

Pretty much this - since you can not know for certain what drive letters their system is going to already have assigned ( For example my desktop has assigned letters to L: before I even plug in any USB drives due to the multi card reader assigning a letter to each of the card types even if no drive is attached to them !) Once I plug in my External backup drive it gets assigned M:

[pbj]

Cheese and crackers, people.  Paths are relative.  You don't need to specify drive letters if you're running everything off the external drive. 

Stop being so desperate to be correct, take a breath, and think occasionally.

 

[EMDB]

Cheese and crackers, people.  Paths are relative.  You don't need to specify drive letters if you're running everything off the external drive. 

Stop being so desperate to be correct, take a breath, and think occasionally.

 

I say relative paths in this case...

[ark_ader]

If memory serves you can use drive names up to xx: so you can have drive AA and that should be legal for all windoze and DOS from 5.0 and onwards.

[Howard_Casto]

Cheese and crackers, people.  Paths are relative.  You don't need to specify drive letters if you're running everything off the external drive. 

Stop being so desperate to be correct, take a breath, and think occasionally.

 

Except... that they aren't.  Many programs won't accept a relative path in their settings...... so yeah. 

[Haze]

Cheese and crackers, people.  Paths are relative.  You don't need to specify drive letters if you're running everything off the external drive. 

Stop being so desperate to be correct, take a breath, and think occasionally.

 

Except... that they aren't.  Many programs won't accept a relative path in their settings...... so yeah.

that's a flaw in the programs tho, like the hundreds of old games (both DOS and Windows) that assume the CD-ROM is d:/  (how ridiculous does that seem to people now)

You *can't* assume drive letters, if the software you have requires you to then find better software, or (if development is still active) highlight what a bad idea it is and hope the author of the software sees how important allowing them is.

unfortunately relative paths alone do mean you can't reference a drive other than the one your software is on, so if you wanted a dual drive plug-in system (roms on one, chds on another) you still couldn't do that, there there is no 'fixed drive letters across different computers' solution.  At best you could write a script that scans all possible drive letters looking for some dummy file you left on the root of the drive, and writing out a config file based on that, but that's kinda gross, and anybody sensible has auto-play disabled so it would still need to be executed manually.

[pbj]

Except... that they aren't.  Many programs won't accept a relative path in their settings...... so yeah.

We aren't discussing "many programs."

We are discussing emulators.

I've yet to encounter one that doesn't work with relative paths.  Feel free to spend an hour on Google finding an exception that nobody uses anymore.

 

[SavannahLion]

I'm not feeling so hot so I'm not really inclined to fully test this thought process out.

If Autoplay is disabled on that PC, there's not a whole lot you can do to get around that without doing some partition voodoo to bypass it. So if you can accept a one click operation, in lieu of autoplay, you should be OK. I'll leave it to you to figure out how to get a script to autorun when a drive is plugged in if such operation is allowed on that PC.

Second problem is that you need admin rights to make the changes. That said... Try this basic framework I whipped up.

Code: [Select]

@ECHO OFF
REM SET THE DESIRED DRIVE LETTER
SET testnudr=U
REM GET THE CURRENT DRIVE LETTER
SET testdr=%~d0
REM PATH TO THE DISKPART SCRIPT FILE
SET testfile=%~d0\test.txt
REM USE DISKPART TO "SET THE FOCUS" TO THE DRIVE
>%testfile% ECHO select volume=%testdr:~0,1%
REM I GET PROBLEMS IF I DON'T HAVE A BLANK LINE BETWEEN EACH COMMAND??
>>%testfile% ECHO=
REM WHY U? MEH.....
>>%testfile% ECHO assign letter=%testnudr%
REM DON'T BLINK, ENTER THE ADMIN PASSWORD WHEN IT COMES UP.
call diskpart.exe /s %testfile%

Open up NOTEPAD (must be notepad or some other "barebones" text editor. Don't use Word for this!!) and give it some random file name. Like test.bat. Put it into the ROOT directory, eg E:\test.bat of the external drive. DON'T DO THIS ON YOUR PRIMARY INTERNAL DRIVE

Now... copy and paste the code above into that batch file and save it. Now, every time you plug in the drive and it's not the right drive letter, run that batch file.

Some caveats.

I like my scripts to run silent. I didn't capture any errors that might crop up with DISKPART.

The script doesn't bother to check if another drive already exists in the desired "slot". I can add it in easily enough but it would dilute what I wanted to show you, the use of Diskpart.

Diskpart should be on WinXP or later. I tested the above script on Win8 and it worked fine. If you're still using anything pre-WinXp, I can't help you.

You can also accomplish the same thing using PowerShell instead of Batch. I was aiming for lowest common denominator.

Here are some links that are worth reading.
Windows Batch Scripting
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Windows_Batch_Scripting
DiskPart Command-Line options
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766465%28v=ws.10%29.aspx

Be careful with it. Only you can be responsible if you don't read up and understand what each command does.