Remove drive Q microsoft office click-to-run 2010 (protected)

There is no trace of Microsoft office on my computer and I don't think there has been for more than 5 years, but just today there appeared a drive Q labeled microsoft office click-to-run 2010 (protected). I can't remove it. All the answers on answers.microsoft seem to think that either uninstalling microsoft office will remove it or that you simply can't remove it. I'd appreciate anyone that can tell me why it's there or how to remove it.

If you try to click on the drive you get a message "Please insert a disk into Microsoft Office Click-to-Run 2010 (Protected) (Q:)."

Solution 1:

I'm pretty sure its one of your card reader slots that's Q:, it's just labelled wrong due to Office being previously installed.

You should be able to change its label by heading into the registry to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\DriveIcons\Q, and then editing the (Default) setting in the DefaultLabel sub key.

Not sure why it would suddenly show up again, unless you just added the card reader, or perhaps disabled "Hide empty drives in the Computer folder" in Explorer's settings.