I have a modified file system on windows 8 and dont want it to change with windows 10

[Jack Warden]

I have windows 8.1 pro currently and run a dual drive system on my computer consisting of an ssd for the OS and an hdd for everything else. I have transferred the default documents, photos, download folder etc to my hdd and am still looking to do the same with the appdata folder but dont want to risk f---ing everything up so its not happening. I also want to get windows 10 and have already reserved a copy. Also for anyone who doesnt know if you have 8pro you get 10 pro
I want to know:

1. Will it mess up my file config as i must disconnect the hdd for OS install?
2. Is the upgrade worth the hassle?
3. Will it put my lovely computer performance in the sewer?
4. Will it screw up everything?
5. Will it just all around piss me off
6. This is my 3 month old $2000 home built computer so please make sure all advice is well backed and you dont "think", you "know" because I want to make sure nothing bad happens and it doesn't affect my antivirus as i never have trusted tech giants and never will!!!!!!!

 

[USAFRet]

1. Do NOT move your AppData folder. Serves no purpose, and many problems may ensue.
Doc/Photo/Music/Downloads, sure.
AppData..no.

I can't stress that strongly enough.

2. Seeing as no one outside a few people in Microsoft central has ever done the full upgrade from 8.1 to the final release of Win 10...AND no one (obviously) has done it with your particular hardware/software combination...
It is impossible to state categorically that nothing bad will happen with your PC.

The last year of beta testing (Insider program with the Tech Preview) has of course shaken out most of the bugs, install and use.
But there WILL some small subset of people where it fails.

My advice? Wait a few months to do the upgrade. See how it goes.

Why do you desire to move the AppData folder to elsewhere?

 

[gangrel]

I would, first and foremost, suggest you WAIT to install Win 10 for a couple of months, and review the comments about it. None of us can really speak to questions 2-5...even if someone's got a Preview version, that's not the final version. And to see if there's any major problems with doing the installation.

One idea would be this: get yourself another SSD. When you're ready to install Win 10, clone your SSD to the new one. Make sure you can boot from both of them. Now you can upgrade to 10 on one of them, and try it out, while maintaining a Known Good Win 8 system. Another option along those lines would be to see if you can install Win 10 on the new SSD, while at the same time porting over all the settings stuff from the current Win 8. My gut feeling is, they won't support that, tho. You can do a clean install onto the new SSD, of course, and still have the older SSD and all its contents safe and secure, but of course you'd have to re-install programs and special drivers, and go through all the usual new-system-install setup.

 

[The_Prophecy]

Hi Jack,

1. You won't need to disconnect the HDD to do the upgrade (at least, either doing so or not doing so will not prevent you from being able to upgrade).

2. The upgrade being worth the hassle is really up to you... no one else can really say for sure.

3. No. Performance on Windows 10 is anticipated to be the same or better than 7 and 8.1.

4. Again, that's all in the eye of the beholder.

5. See above.

6. Anything i'm not sure about, I'll note it.

To be honest, I've never set a machine up that way and then tried the upgrade. I have a couple of systems here that I could certainly give it a shot on to give you an idea of what you would be getting into. As far as the theoretical part of this goes, I get the feeling that it will indeed switch the setup back to the way Windows arranges the AppData, Docs, Photo's, etc.. folders to stock, but I won't know for sure until I try it out. I'm certainly happy to try though, as it kills 2 birds with one stone for me (satisfies my own curiosity, and helps you know how to proceed).

One interesting thing to note from your message above however... you don't trust tech giants, yet you're running Windows 8.1? I would have thought if you REALLY don't trust tech giants, you would be running some flavor of Linux on that homebuilt box?

I'm nitpicking though. I'll fire up one of the test systems beside me and try this out (unless someone else has already done so can reply and save me the time). FYI - Will take a bit though, as all my test boxes are running 10 right now.

 

[Jack Warden]

1. Do NOT move your AppData folder. Serves no purpose, and many problems may ensue.
Doc/Photo/Music/Downloads, sure.
AppData..no.

I can't stress that strongly enough.

2. Seeing as no one outside a few people in Microsoft central has ever done the full upgrade from 8.1 to the final release of Win 10...AND no one (obviously) has done it with your particular hardware/software combination...
It is impossible to state categorically that nothing bad will happen with your PC.

The last year of beta testing (Insider program with the Tech Preview) has of course shaken out most of the bugs, install and use.
But there WILL some small subset of people where it fails.

My advice? Wait a few months to do the upgrade. See how it goes.

Why do you desire to move the AppData folder to elsewhere?

I game a lot and some of my appdata files are absolutely HUGE Specifically resource pack and world save related and minecraft and i dont want to use too much of the space on my ssd

 

[USAFRet]

And what size is this SSD?

 

[Jack Warden]

And what size is this SSD?

128GB

 

[The_Prophecy]

Yeah that's actually a legit concern with your current setup. For the future, I would invest in a larger SSD to avoid problems like this down the road, but in the meantime...

With regards to a game like Minecraft, I find it actually works better storing the folder from AppData on OneDrive. if you have a solid internet connection, you can tell it to make that folder available Online Only, and then give Minecraft the new path via Onedrive in it's Settings. Not a total solution, but should help a bit...

 

[USAFRet]

And what size is this SSD?

128GB

Is there anywhere else that minecraft mod data can go? As above, OneDrive, maybe.
Moving that should be fine, but moving the whole AppData thing may cause pain for other applications.

 

[The_Prophecy]

Moving the entire AppData folder would indeed cause a LOT of other headaches. I wouldn't even bother trying it.

You can do things like moving the Minecraft folder out of AppData to another location (or do the same for some other programs that won't freak out when you do) but AppData itself? Forget it.

Edit: You can put the .Minecraft folder anywhere.... just have to point the Minecraft game to the new location of .minecraft after you move it so it knows where to load the game data from. I put mine on OneDrive because I might need to access it from more than one computer.