Moving users folder on Windows Vista/7 to another partition

When I format the computer and reinstall Windows, my first step is move the My Documents folder to another partition. In Windows XP it wasn't enough because the desktop folder and another user folders was in the primary partition.

Now in Windows Vista and 7 we can use junctions/symlinks to "move" the folder to another partition and Windows and another programs will think that the data is in the primary partition.

What the fastest and secure steps to move the Users folder to another partition and to create the hardlinks correctly?

Solution 1:

mklink /d myuser d:\moved\myuser

On modern versions of NTFS, junction points which you used on XP are replaced with directory symlinks.

Though, I don't really recommend doing this... you're not likely to see any performance benefit.

Solution 2:

The easiest and most reliable method of getting your user profile onto another (i.e., non-system) partition is to have Windows create it there for you. On Vista, I've used the following steps to have my user profile created on D: instead of C:.

1. Install Vista and make the first user account "Administrator".

2. Login. Use regedit.exe to modify the ProfilesDirectory registry key to point to the D: partition.

   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList
     ProfilesDirectory = D:\Users
   

3. Create your normal user account, login, logout.

4. Login to Administrator and change the ProfilesDirectory registry key back to its original value (%SystemDrive%\Users).

5. Use the account created at step (3) as your normal user account (for application install and use).

This works much better than manually moving the folders and creating symlinks/junctions.

Solution 3:

There is a similar question on serverfault, you should check that out.

But I have had serious second thoughts about this being a good idea.