USB drive letter under Windows XP
I have to look this up every time I do it so here’s a fast tutorial on changing the letter for a USB storage device under Windows XP. I’m using this for my newly-flashed iriver that I told you about recently.
Go to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Storage -> Disk Management. Your device will be listed and if you right-click there’s an option to “Change drive letter and paths”.
Had to do this earlier today. Windows XP allocated the next drive letter it thought was available, despite me already using it with SUBST. Have you tried running any of the management consoles from the command line, e.g. compmgmt.msc (they’re all in the PATH)?
Geoff – hello :) I haven’t played with any of the command line stuff, no. If it isn’t in /mnt then I’m stumped and just go with my usual Windows approach of starting in control panel and clicking on likely pictures until something happens. Do you have a quick version of how I would deal with a drive letter clash under Windows using the command line? I’d love to see it if you do …
I think Geoff meant instead of going through all the menus to get to Computer Management – just do:
start->run ‘compmgmt.msc’
If only I’d caught up with your blog before today. I had to play with drive letters under XP yesterday – I ended up having to look it up too – it’s just not where it used to be! My new iPod Shuffle was causing some interesting things to happen because a few apps decided that my iPod was my old C drive.
Simon: And there’s me thinking Windows had joined us in the world of typing what you want rather than navigating unlikely combinations of icons! Although I’ve heard good things about a Katapult -like Start Menu for Vista.
dotjay: Clearly I’m the fount of all knowledge and you should read my site regularly :)