Need to relocate the Documents and Settings directory to another partition without using sysinternal

I wish to relocate the c:Documents and Settings directory to another partition (encrypted but not with EFS. I have used "junction" from sysinternals to relocate the various user subdirectories with mount points to the encrypted partition and that works fine. But I really want a solution where I can simply relocate the whole directory rather than use "junction."

By having the SAM, paging file, user data directories, temp directories, miniroot, dump fileb all relocated to the encrypted partition, I don?t need to encrypt the system boot partiton. What is left is common to most systems. This gives me a lot more flexibility for system recovery, simplifies backup and maximizes performance as the common applications are not encrypted only the settings they use for each user.

So your advice on how to relocate the Documents and Settings directory would be appreciated.

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The default Documents and Settings folder used by Windows 2000 and Windows XP cannot be moved or renamed. Doing so will produce an error which will cause problems upon bootup, new user creation and every local logon.

However, it is possible to designate a different folder to be used as the default storage location for the user profile cache. But this setting must be defined when you first install the OS. It cannot be changed after installation has completed.

Basically, you must perform an install using an unattended answer file script with the following item included:

[GuiUNattended]
ProfilesDir = z:foldername

Where Z is a drive letter of a local hard drive and foldername is the name of the intended Documents and Settings material alternate destination folder.

For more information on this issue, see Microsoft knowledge base document < a HREF=http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q236621>"Cannot Move or Rename the Documents and Settings Folder", (Q236621).

This was first published in January 2002

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