Is your Windows boot drive letter: C?

PB · Post by PB » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:22 pm

Is it safe to assume that the average Windows boot drive letter is C? Because
I've been using the GetWindowsDirectory API to see which drive Windows is
installed on, but this has the potential to be something other than C, which
could be a problem for what I want to do (a hardware hash).

Or to put it another way: Would every Windows setup have a C drive, just
like it always has an A floppy drive (even if not used)? So would it maybe be
considered to be out of the norm to NOT have a C drive?

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:28 pm

PB wrote:just
like it always has an A floppy drive (even if not used)

euhm is that true?

edit:
Confirmed its NOT true. And no, windows doesnt always have a C drive either

PB · Post by PB » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:31 pm

I think so... I once read that A and B are always floppies, and C is the first
hard drive, which is usually (but not always) the boot drive. But I haven't
pulled out my floppy (oo-er) to see what happens in My Computer to A:,
maybe it does disappear? Can anyone without a floppy drive confirm?

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:31 pm

Updated my post.
I have 2 laptops with no floppy, no a-drive.

PB · Post by PB » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:36 pm

Thanks for confirming. Must've been a very old article I read.

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:40 pm

hehe well, some of us arent using 95 anymore

(i know you use xp

)

Post by **freak** » Mon Feb 27, 2006 12:21 am

Yes, with older windows versions it was like that. A and B were floppies if present,
and C was always the first harddrive.
Dunno about NT, but atleast since Win2k, the system internally does not work
with drive letters at all anymore. The driveletters are only a mapping for the
user so to speak, and it can be freely changed. (only the drive letter where
you install the system can not be changed after the installation but before that you can)

You can have a Windows system with only a drive Z and nothing else if you want nowadays.

Its quite uncommon to not have a C drive though, but possible.

PB · Post by PB » Mon Feb 27, 2006 12:35 am

Okay, due to the fact that relying on C alone is unreliable, I've approached
the hash with a failsafe technique: I parse all drive letters (A-Z) and if they
are of #DRIVE_FIXED type, then I will note the drive in the hash. That way,
it doesn't matter where Windows is installed, or if a C drive is present.

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