Detecting already installed programs on a secondary HDD in Windows 8

Question

I recently bought a new computer and installed Windows 8 on to a 150Gb hdd, with a 2Tb hdd for most programs and files. After a week of using the computer and installing a fair few programs, I have been given a bigger faster hard drive to use as my primary, with the 2Tb remaining as my data/programs.

Now that I have installed Windows on this again, none of my programs installed to the large disk are available through the start menu, and I can't seem to find a solution through google.

A friend suggested adding shortcuts to my desktop but that just looks cluttered and becomes ridiculous with a large number of programs.

Is there a way I can get Windows to find these programs, which are still intact on the second disk, without having to re-install them all?

Any help would be much appreciated!

Solution

The best way to go is usually to re-install your programs. That will ensure proper operation since many program installers also put information in the windows registry, put some files in your Users folder, and/or install any additional libraries they require (eg. Java, DirectX, .NET, etc.) -- those were lost by reinstalling windows.

That said, as you probably noticed, many programs will still work anyway. In such case, to place icons to your Start Screen instead of the Desktop, do this:

• Open File Explorer
• Enable Hidden Files in the View ribbon (since C:\ProgramData is hidden)
• Go to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\ - this is where Start Screen shortcuts are stored. Any shortcut you add there will automatically appear in the Start Screen.

However, by default, you don't have permission to create shortcuts there. To remedy this,

• Right-click on the Programs folder and select Properties
• Go to the Security tab and click the Edit button
• Select `Users
• Check the Modify checkbox (which will also check the Write checkbox)
• Click OK, and OK again

Now you can create shortcuts to your programs, or move your existing Desktop shortcuts. You don't have to create subfolders, but if you do they will also be grouped accordingly in the "All Apps" screen.

Comments

[Karan]

The easiest and fastest solution would have been if you'd simply cloned your existing Win8 install.