HowTo: Move your SimBin Folder to another Partition/Drive

After the last update I and maybe some of you are a bit unhappy about the new location where the user related files of GTR Evo are stored. They are inside the “My Documents” folder usually at your system partition, in case you don’t know yet. It was done for Vista to avoid problems when “working” with a non-admin account (I believe).

Personally I don’t like to have it there for several reasons. One option I already read about is putting your “My Documents” folder completely to another location. (Right click -> choose target …) It sounds simple and maybe it’s suitable for the one or the other, but I don’t want to have this folder somewhere else, I don’t use it at all.

I’d like to show you another option: NTFS Junctions or Volume Mountpoints or Symbolic Links (Vista only). It’s basically a link placed anywhere on your hard disk, pointing to a different folder, virtually mounting it there. These links are totally transparent to the operating system and look and behave like normal folders.

In Windows XP there is a limitation to Junctions. They are only able to point to folders that belong to the same volume (but can be on a different partition). In Vista one can use Symbolic Links, which work like Junctions but are not limited to a single volume. If you urgently need to put your files to a different disk in XP you can use a Volume Mountpoint but this is not entirely nice, because your Race07 folder will be a top level folder of the referenced drive.

Now on to the facts …

Junctions, Volume Mountpoints and Symbolic Links are not easily available by default. If you install this nice little tool http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html you get these cool features into the context menu of your windows explorer. Please follow the instructions on the page. The file system on your drive(s) has to be NTFS (that’s usually the case). Otherwise the features will not be available.

I did not test it with Vista, because I don’t have it, but I’m pretty sure it will work as described. It’s certainly a good idea to keep a copy of the affected files until everything works fine. Do it with care and at your own risk ;) .

Do not put the files to their former location. Gtr Evo will be confused a bit and who knows what other serious problems it might cause.

Step by Step Guides:
(Please refer to the attached images too. I have a German Windows, so “Eigene Dateien” = “My Documents”)

Junctions (XP), Symbolic Links (Vista):
1. Move your “My Documents\SimBin” folder to the desired location (restricted to the same volume in WinXP).
2. You can rename that folder if you want.
3. Right click that moved “SimBin” folder and choose “Pick Link Source”
4. Change to your “My Documents” folder, right click into the free space inside the right pane and choose “Drop as … -> Junction” (XP) or “Drop as -> Symbolic Link” (Vista)
5. If the created Junction is not named “SimBin” rename it to “SimBin”.
6. Done.
7. Caution: Never ever simply DELETE the Junction in the “My Documents” folder by pressing “DEL” or choosing “Delete” from the context menu! This will delete all the files where this Junction is pointing to – remember, it’s a LINK! Instead choose “Delete Junction” from the context menu to remove the link.

Volume Mountpoint (different volume in Win XP)
1. Move your “My Documents\SimBin\Race07” folder to the root of the desired drive.
2. Delete the now empty “My Documents\SimBin” folder.
3. Right click the drive and choose “Pick Link Source”.
4. Change to your “My Documents” Folder, right click into the free space inside the right pane and choose “Drop as … -> Volume Mountpoint”
5. Rename the Mountpoint to “SimBin”.
6. Done.
7. Caution: Never ever simply DELETE this Mountpoint in the “My Documents” folder by pressing “DEL” or choosing “Delete” from the context menu! This will delete all files on the mounted drive, it’s a LINK! Instead choose “Delete Mountpoint” from the context menu to remove the link.

Feedback and comments are welcome. If you find a mistake please tell me.
 

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