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Win7 Home Premium reinstall / application reinstall

  • 14-01-2011 09:02AM
    #1
    ArthurG
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,307 ✭✭✭


    Hi,

    Recently had to do a full Win7 reinstall for a few reasons. While the process was generally very easy, reinstalling apps is a bit of a pain.

    I use an 80gig HD as my windows boot drive, and the only thing other than windows that goes on there are drivers.

    All my apps go on a separate drive (firefox, photoshop, games, itunes etc).

    So, my question is, given that I dont wipe the drive with the apps, is there any way I can continue to use them after reinstalling windows?. Currently I delete the various application folders from the other drive, and reinstall, as Windows doesn't recognise them after the reinstall. While its not terribly inconvenient, particualrly something like iTunes is a pain when I need to rebuild the library.

    Any ideas?.

    Thanks!!


Comments

  • #2
    tman
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,339 ✭✭✭✭tman


    You shouldn't really have to rebuild the iTunes library if you're using the same username as before, this would be saved in c:\users\yourname\music iirc, so if you're using a different name you'd just have to copy the ITunes folder across from one music folder to the other.
    It depends on the app really... Some of them will install services or copy necessary dlls to system32, so reinstalling them might be your best bet, other apps will just work...


  • #3
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 96,078 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    Not unless you use www.portableapps.com



    almost every other program stores settings in the registry, which means you have to reinstall them after a clean install or a corrupt registry

    then there are shared dll's and other files, things like dotnet or other dependencies that you would have to reload

    you have to make sure your program files folder is also not on the first drive

    and even then there will be something you've forgotten or is undocumented


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