Windows 10: File Explorer

You can legally download an ISO from MS and since you've already installed Windows 10 previously, you won't have to worry about activating it. Ignore prompts for activation during install and it should be activated by the time you hit the desktop.

 

Download the Windows ISO from here: Windows 10 Download - Tech Bench
then use: Rufus - Create bootable USB to create an installation media on a USB.
One thing I forgot to mention. During the Installation, when prompted for product key, click on "I don't have a product key" or "Skip this step".

 

Thanks swarfega. I'll go off down this path (again) with your suggestion and that of topgundcp. Will post back in a month or two *Party !

 

Appreciate the links, topgundcp. Will now enter déj vu mode. I'll update this post later on the outcome *Smile.

 

OK, I blitzed everything, reallocated the drives in the proper sequence and clean installed Win 10 Pro 64 using a USB stick with the downloaded ISO created by Rufus. As I previously mentioned in an above reply to topgundcp though, I'm back to the same situation as before, except now it is the C drive that is not visible outside of ThisPC *Sad. See images.

 

@Jezzer56:
Did you try this: remove and add drives from Navigation tree - tutorial
And you can't add nonremovable drives as per tutorial above.

 

@Jezzer56:
Whatever 'Removable Drives' are listed in your 'Safely Eject' flyout...





will be the ones that show underneath 'This PC'





And, it won't be the C: drive, or whatever drive you have the 'System Reserved' on.

 

Thanks for your reply, Edwin. Unless terminology has changed whilst I was asleep, I would class my 3 HDDs as fixed disks (non removable). They are inside the chassis of my PC. However, they appear on the safely remove hardware option, although I haven't tried ejecting any of the three to date. Apparently brink has some how-to's on File Explorer, so I will review those in an attempt to sort the navigation pain (sorry pane *really) out.

 

AndreTen - thanks for the link. I hadn't seen this, despite numerous searches - wood and trees come to mind *chuckle. I'm sure that and other articles will hold something of benefit.

 

If they appear on the safely remove list then you might have them set as hot swap in BIOS.

 

This is an interesting problem!

I looked at your system specs but all I got was Intel 2500K and a Gigabytes Motherboard.
Looks like you have a hot swap mobile rack connected to a Internal SATA backplane or hot swap drive supported by BIOS!

Can you give us a little more info on your setup?

 

Hi snoopy51. I'll reply to your post, but it's also relevant to the last post from topgundcp, as it refers to the BIOS.

My motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-H67MA-D2H-B3. The processor is an Intel Core i5-2500K CPU @ 3.30GHz.

The motherboard supports 'hot plug' only if the AHCI option is set, as opposed to the remaining IDE or RAID options. I have AHCI set, which is why the 3 HDDs appear under the 'safely remove hardware' popup (as per topgundcp). I don't see any independent way of setting these to non swappable, but retain any benefits of AHCI. I don't have any SSDs, so I suppose there may not be any disadvantages of resorting to IDE . I did try changing to IDE mode, but the PC then failed to boot, so I reverted back to AHCI. Registry entry changes are probably required prior to attempting to change the mode to IDE. Having the drives appear in 'safely remove hardware' is no big deal though. The primary reason for this thread was to find out why the C drive doesn't appear in the navigation pane along with the other HDDs outside of 'ThisPC'. It seems that the 'System Reserved' partition must, in some way, inhibit the display. Originally, I had my E drive on Disk0, along with the reserved partition, and the E didn't show outside of 'ThisPC'. Now that I corrected the setup so that C is on Disk0, the problem has just shifted slightly *Redface.

 

I guess it depends on the BIOS of the MB. Mine is set AHCI and can enable/disable Hot Swap:

 

Mine was probably one of the last Gigabyte motherboards produced without the new fangled UEFI. Unfortunately, there is no way to set drives to non hot plug state, other than by switching to IDE mode. I doubt downloading any available motherboard update would change this. This will probably have to wait until I build my next PC, at which point I'll ensure I purchase a motherboard with the required options. May be sooner that I had planned *Biggrin.

 

You know of course, that if you set drives to non removable state, you will not have them in the folder tree - not even those, you have now.
If you want to set them as non removable, install latest intel SATA drivers (Rapid storage) for you chipset. Even if you don't intend to use RAID, this are consedered the best sata drivers.