Windows 10: Duplicate D:\ drive

Would imaging the D: drive be the correct way to go? I would think if they image the drive when they do the restore the drive would be right back where it started.

 

Hi, I was careful to specify
Then mount the image of D: and copy the data from that to D:

That's not the same as restoring it- simply recovering the files folders from the image, using the image as a backup store.

Perhaps we need to research how junctions are actually implemented, assuming that's the issue..

Note: I'm beginning to think from what I've read that something is stored in the folder when a link is created.. I can't yet understand this or found a good enough description. But if so, formatting and copying back won't work.

***** This the first thing to try:
Obtaining a list of junction points


A list of all the junctions present in the current directory can be obtained from an elevated Command Prompt as Admin by executing dir /aL, and a list of all the junctions present on a disk volume, by executing dir /aL /s C:\, where "C:" is the volume to scan.

NTFS junction point - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I.e. before actually doing anything, let's see if there's anything there.
May as well scan both C and D for completeness.

 

Thank you both for the information, this is a great conversation. *Smile

I will work on trying the suggestions provided either later today or tomorrow and report back.

 

I never had to deal with junctions so I haven't a clue what to suggest. I'm thinking that the problem is on the D: drive. If it is than I don't see why saving the files and formatting the D: drive wouldn't work. If It's something on the C: drive causing this than I have no Idea what to try.

 

Let us know how it goes. Hopefully you'll get this solved. *Smile

 

I never had to deal with junctions

Same here.. so I'm thinking...
- it's easy to run that command and just see what it turns up. If nothing, it's not a junction. End of that idea.
- so then just go with copying off, formatting, copying back and see what happens.

 

Sorry for coming late !

dir /aL /s C:\ WILL find junctions, since there are system-created ones, such as the "Documents and settings" directory junction, which is perfectly normal.

I use junctions here and there, and imho it's very unlikely that you created one by mistake. However, checking for junctions won't cost you anything except search time.

I personnally doubt there's really a mirror between D:\ and your Videos folder, if adding/removing documents to D:\ adds/removes them to/from your Videos folder and vice-versa, it's more likely that the Videos folder is still configured to be D:\.

What do you see on the Location tab when you right click and choose Properties on your Videos folder ? You have to change that directory location to another one such as a subdirectory of D:\ (D:\Videos for example), and when you get a yes/no prompt about whether or not you want to move everything to the new location, say NO. You should not get a permission denied message, unless you don't have the rights to create this directory. You can create the directory in the file manager first if you want...

 

Hey NovHak,
Welcome back and no need to apologize. So I just did the dir /aL /s C:\ as well as dir /aL /s D:\. There were a lot of junctions listed when I did it on C:\ as expected but nothing that jumped out or looked like it linked the the D:\ drive. There were no junctions listed when I ran the command on the D:\.

So I would guess that this is not it. No harm, no foul.

I do not think there is a mirror between D:\ and my Videos folder. I think that whatever mistake I made before, by "moving" C:\Users\...\Videos to D:\ instead of D:\Videos. This screwed things up and I'm not sure why. Because I clicked to merge everything, the D:\ drive now shows once normally (listed as DATA (D*Smile) and then once as D:\ with the icon of my Videos folder. These are both under "This PC" in File Explorer. Clicking on the properties for either iteration of the D: drive shows that the default location is is C:\Users\...\Videos, which should not be the case.

Also, I did restore the Original Videos folder using a .bat file from another thread on the Tenforums.

 

I just duplicated this and I just solved it. Go to the Videos folder on your C:\ and go to the Move section within Properties. Change the location back to C:\Users\x\Name\Videos. *Biggrin
Edit: This just broke it instead -_-

 

Okay, so as I was typing my last message, I was going back to and forth and I seem to have fixed my problem. I think this is what NovHak was trying to suggest at the bottom of his post.

What I did was click on the File Properties for the D:\ (with the Videos icon), not the one that is my DATA (D: ) which is the proper one, clicked on restore default location, said NO to the merge, then another window came up (which I think I might have said Yes to originally, which could be the original source of my problem - I know, this problem is a result of user error*cry) and I said Yes (after fully reading it and understanding it this time. The second message is as follows (please ignore the name and the fact that it's to OneDrive, I stole the picture from Access Denied - moving Pictures folder to default or other locations - Windows 10 Forums but the rest of the wording is what I saw).




This seemed to disconnect (or what ever the heck was happening) the two listed D: drives. DATA (D: ) is normal. I still had D:\ with the videos icon kicking around. I made attempts to include this in the C:\User\...\Videos folder and then ended up with sub folders. Not EXACTLY sure where in the process of what I did fixed it, but at one point I closed the File Explorer window and when I reopened it everything was back to normal.

Normal DATA (D: ), Normal Videos folder in the proper location and no subfolder, and no random D:\ drive with the Videos icon. Did a full shut down and restart and everything is looking as it should!

No formatting of the D: drive either, so that's a bonus!

Thank you so much Winuser, NovHak, and dalchina (in order of appearance in the thread *Wink) for all of your help and suggestions. I really appreciated it! You guys and/or girls rock!

 

Okay after experimenting, I:
1 Made a New Folder on the D:\ drive
2 Set the Video's link as D:\New Folder (Click No!)
3 Moved the Video link back to videos (Click Yes)
4 Reassign the D:\ drive letter
5 Reassign the drive letter back to D:

 

Uh Oh, I hope it isn't actually broken, I'd certainly hate for someone to try to help me and then end up screwing up something on their end. I actually just got my issue sorted out and everything appears to be back to normal. Let us know if something is screwed up that you can't fix. Not saying I'll definitely be able to help, but I got help here, so if I'm able to give back I'd certainly try.

 

Great- hard to imagine what was happening without the problem to hand.
Changing some settings in Win 10 can sometimes be more problematic than in previous versions.

(And I didn't want to try the same thing on mine...*chuckle)

 

hehe fixed- and you beat me. xD

 

This sounds similar to what I ended up doing, just that I pointed it back to the original Videos location, which I restored from a .bat file (I believe I found it in a thread on tenforums about removing or restoring the User folders.

Thanks for your help and suggestions, SamTheGr8est!