Why does Windows still install on C drive?

https://www.google.com/search?q=Why+does+Windows+still+install+on+C+drive

As opposed to...?

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Backwards compatibility.
Literally to make sure 20-30 year old, horribly written, and unmaintained ENTERPRISE applications run.

>>58215292
As opposed to something sane like having the boot drive be the root of your entire OS, instead of C:\System32\

>>58215302
>something sane
>Windows

https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20060328-17/?p=31753
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20100128-00/?p=15153

>>58215302
Mounting devices all over the place does not make much more sence than having drives. Its all just a flavors of the same insanity.

>>58215273
It doesn't, retard.

>he doesn't use floppies
neo-/g/ is real.

>>58215289
/thread
also, fpbp.

mods be like:
>huh? ban everyone who reports this shit thread.

A:\ and B:\ were used for floppy drives so it's better to just not fuck with it.

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>>58215472
>Mounting devices all over the place
OSes tend to have standardized locations for mounting, such as /mnt or /media
OS X has pic related, though you can mount to arbitrary locations if you really wanted.

Because A and B are for floppies and D is for an optical drive, and why reassign it to any other letter?

(C:)

>>58215640
>that smile face
windows will always install there because its the happy drive.

>>58215273
Microsoft is just too damn lazy to change it from the old days when the floppy drives would be A: and B:.

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>>58215273
C for cuck drive

>>58215566
OS X's mounting system can be a pain
>every mounted drive has a symlink created in /Volumes
>OS drive starts filling up, no idea why as the only writes that go to it are logs
>turns out the symlink for my main storage drive somehow became a directory
>instead of following the symlink to the root of the storage drive it was actually saving everything in the directory /Volumes/Storage
It's pretty much impossible to fix without a reinstall as far as I can tell too.

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>>58215748
(B:) looks like orc teeth

>not having a ^ drive

(^:)

>>58216050
>using the drive with a carat nose

Drive letters is just a better solution.easier to deal with.

>>58215748
A: looks like someone yapping downward

>>58215748

(D:) looks like someone with a big nose and a raised unibrow.

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>>58216565
problem, baby backed bitch?

>>58215273
Windows installs on C drive because A drive is traditionally reserved for 3.5" floppy disks and B drive is traditionally reserved for 5.25" floppy disks.

>>58215518
suck my fucking dick you fucking retard

>>58217470
>21st century
>floppy disks

what happens if you add more drives once you hit Z drive?

>>58215273
Because some bank somewhere is using software that expects Windows to always be C:/.

Basically, it's an old DOS styling that would break anything that connects to an IBM mainframe if changed.

>>58218262
>circa 2008
>friend was in college.
he thought 3.5" floppy drives were more secure than usb sticks.
told him many times that floppy disks are notorious for randomly getting corrupt.
this was only 7 years ago.
im pretty sure windows 7 was coming out when he finally stopped using floppy drives.

>>58218356

guyz pls i has to know

>>58218356
>>58219659
You must use mount points.

>>58215273
C is only the default. You can change where it's installed.

>>58215822
This is why you buy a pro key for $30

>>58221461
too complicated...

This one time I found a guide online how to relocate the Windows folder to another hard drive. It required me to reinstall Windows entirely, and changing some files after booting into the USB key. I can't remember much, though.

>>58221461
>paying $30 for something that should be free
death to pajeet

>>58215292
A:
Who owns a floppy drive as of 2016 except in retarded ass-backwards as fuck countries like Japan? On GNU+Linux masterrace, it's /dev/sda. Why is it not A: in Windows?

>>58215504
>read about win10 dropping floppy support
>it's just USB floppies, standard floppies work A-OK

dodged the bullet there. thank dog SuperFormat works too.

>>58215273
>Why does Windows still install on C drive?
A better question is why does Microsoft still use those outdated CP/M drive designations?
It causes confusion.
You can probably still have a USB drive grab the same drive letter as a fixed-letter mounted volume.

>>58218262
>>21st century

Pretty much everyone still used floppies until around 2003.

Because through decades people just got used to it.

For a tech literate person it's irrelevant.
For a tech illiterate person it would be completely dumbfounding.

>>58217470
They weren't reserved based on drive type like that; it was just first and second floppy drives, be they 5.25", 3.5", or one of each. (Possibly even 8" floppy drives on older CP/M machines.) Our PC had a 5.25" as A: and a 3.5" as B:.

>>58222341
Why fix what isn't broken?

>put windows on a different drive
>break compatibility with every single legacy program and installer ever
>many of which aren't being maintained but some fucking military or financial institution or hospital uses it anyways
>a plane literally flies into the ground because you moved windows off of C:
>probably multiple planes
>literally all of eastern europe loses power
>because OP had autism and wanted A: to come first
>yfw
C:

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where can you buy a hard drive that looks like this?

>>58215273
>install Linux
>drive divided into 9000 directories
>/boot
>/var
>/etc
>/bin
>/swap
>Windows installs cleanly to just 1 directory on C:\Windows and a hidden system partition
>however you partition it, it's still just one directory on C:\Windows
>no files spilled across twenty partitions
>somehow that's a problem

>>58224857
linux puts literally everything into one directory, /.

>>58225186
>linux puts literally everything into one directory, /.
Every OS puts everything in root, the difference is in how retarded linux does it compared to Windows

>install linux
>a dozen different directories in root directory all of which contain sensitive system-related shit
>user's /home directory nice and organized
>install some programs
>installation drops a hidden folder in your /home
>also drops config files in /etc AND /home
>also drops shit god knows where never tells you unless you read the install script
>installed directories and files always have some retarded 8-character name like it's still 1980s
>ls -a
>300 lines worth of configs and hidden directories
>in user's home folder
>no way to easily get rid of them

Meanwhile on Windows
>system files stay in C:\Windows
>every partition root nice and organized
>user folder nice and organized
>install some programs
>pick installation directory
>installer creates some easy to find registry entries and a directory on partition of choice
>user directory stays nice and organized
>uninstall program
>everything gets deleted with some negligible registry keys that bother nobody left over

And people wonder why nobody uses Linux

Alphabetical order obviously.

>>58225286
linux;
- can get a list of everything a program installed by querying the package manager
- programs run by a normal user will nearly always only create one unique file or folder in the users' home directory, which makes it easy to find and remove

windows;
- no package manager, no way to know what a program installed unless it created its own installation log, which is in no standard location or format
- have to rely on their own uninstallers to do their job properly, if it fails you're stuck cleaning up the mess manually
- programs often used multiple places to store user data (profile folder, documents, appdata roaming, appdata local, one or more keys in the registry, etc)

>>58225368
>linux;
>- can get a list of everything a program installed by querying the package manager
Would not be necessary if it wasn't so messy

>- programs run by a normal user will nearly always only create one unique file or folder in the users' home directory, which makes it easy to find and remove
It's not desirable to have your home directory littered with a million config files and directories

>windows;
>- no package manager, no way to know what a program installed unless it created its own installation log, which is in no standard location or format
You never need to do this because you know what you install, unlike Linux which has to pull 200 dependencies to install one program

>- have to rely on their own uninstallers to do their job properly, if it fails you're stuck cleaning up the mess manually
At least you don't have to delete shit out of directories that contain critical system files to clean up the "mess"

>- programs often used multiple places to store user data (profile folder, documents, appdata roaming, appdata local, one or more keys in the registry, etc)
Which are all (except for Documents) places designed for program data storage, Linux programs drop shit into system directories and it adds up to a huge mess in the long run and increases risk of uninstall scripts fucking you up if someone makes a typo and accidentally cleans out your entire /etc

Imagine if Windows installed every program into system32? That's what Linux does with EVERYTHING

>>58225286
linux doesn't use different partitions for the folders, there may seem a lot of folders, but they all serve a purpose and having them in root (without being to many) actually helps.
>installer creates some easy to find registry entries
>everything gets deleted with some negligible registry keys that bother nobody left over
you cannot be serious, this even contradicts itself

>>58225442
>Would not be necessary if it wasn't so messy
how can you call it messy when it's all tracked and documented by the package manager?
you can ask it which package owns any file, and find missing files easily
can you do the same in windows?

>It's not desirable to have your home directory littered with a million config files and directories
most of the time they're in hidden files/folders, so they won't be visible in normal circumstances, much like how the registry and appdata in windows are "invisible"

>You never need to do this because you know what you install, unlike Linux which has to pull 200 dependencies to install one program
you can ask the package manager what depends on what, but you don't need to most of the time, and removing a package removes its dependencies, except for those needed by something else
you won't be left with dependencies that aren't used by anything

>At least you don't have to delete shit out of directories that contain critical system files to clean up the "mess"
if your package managers' database is fucked, you have bigger problems to worry about

>Imagine if Windows installed every program into system32? That's what Linux does with EVERYTHING
i know it seems like a bad idea, i thought so to to begin with, until i learned that the package manager keeps track of everything, so while it /looks/ like an unmaintainable mess, it isn't at all

>>58225524
>how can you call it messy when it's all tracked and documented by the package manager?
>you can ask it which package owns any file, and find missing files easily
>can you do the same in windows?
You have to query your package manager through command line to find files strewn across 10 directories across your hard drive. That's not messy? You never know what's where unless you do that. On Windows you just open Explorer, hop into wherever you installed your shit and delete it, regedit->find->name of program, delete key, then just go to Appdata and delete the appropriate folder. Done. Everything is labeled properly and nothing's hidden among a thousand directories.

Package manager this, package manager that, forget one switch when removing programs and you end up with a ton of leftover configs, directories and shit that you have to remove by hand as root. Or your wondrous package manager removes some dependency due to some dependency graph error and you end up with a broken system that you need to fix all over again. I've had package managers try to remove my desktop environment's dependencies when I tried uninstalling some unrelated program. That's just special. Imagine if I wasn't paying attention.

Lastly, you ever tried using a distro without a package manager? Or at least without automatic dependency resolution? It's a fucking nightmare exactly because this whole approach is an outdated mistake. You can never keep track of everything yourself.

>>58225667
>You never know what's where unless you do that.
and? do that then
and if for some reason you make a mess in there (that is, you bypass the package manager), you can use the package manager to create a list of files not known by the package manager, isolating your mess along with some config files created by programs post-install

>I've had package managers try to remove my desktop environment's dependencies when I tried uninstalling some unrelated program.
the DE and the program you were removing were installed as dependencies for something else, probably a metapackage, this is not an error, just a misunderstanding on your part how the system was set up

>Lastly, you ever tried using a distro without a package manager? Or at least without automatic dependency resolution? It's a fucking nightmare exactly because this whole approach is an outdated mistake. You can never keep track of everything yourself.
yes, if i avoided using the thing that makes managing packages easy as piss, it's be hard as shit
my solution to that is to just use a package manager, because they exist

>>58215292
>>58215302
>>58222341

The only reasonable mount point is /

>>58225782
>yes, if i avoided using the thing that makes managing packages easy as piss, it's be hard as shit
>my solution to that is to just use a package manager, because they exist
Windows doesn't need a package manager, it's easy as piss anyway :^)

>>58225667
>You never know what's where unless you do that.

Why do you keep saying that a package manager is worse than not having one ?
You need a program, you install it with its dependencies. On Windows you need a program, you need to go download it one the internet (and tech illiterate people will likely get malware in the process by downloading it from the first google result), install it, launch it, realize that you miss a dll because you miss whatever version of Microsoft Visual C++ redis, and when you want to uninstall it, you leave all dependencies behind, because of course there is no easy way of finding them.
Please tell me more on how it's more practical.

>you end up with a ton of leftover configs
Config files that are left in /etc/ et /home/user/.config, and can actually be useful to have if you uninstalled a package by mistake. And they are config files, a few kb, it's not like it's going to slow down your computer.

>Lastly, you ever tried using a distro without a package manager?
Nope never, but why would you ever do that ?

And even Windows has some form of packet manager in Windows Server, and it's a shitton easier to deal with

>>58225800
>not mounting /proc

>>58215273
dunno
why do you post on /g/?

>>58222341
>retarded ass-backwards as fuck countries like Japan

Is this the 1850s? Do you even know what Japan is?

>>58215273

Last three times I installed windows it created two partitions C: and E: (D: was already taken by a secondary HDD) and installed itself on E:

>>58222341

Your world must be quite small if you cannot think of an application for diskettes in 2016.

>>58225820
>You need a program, you install it with its dependencies. On Windows you need a program, you need to go download it one the internet, install it, launch it, realize that you miss a dll because you miss whatever version of Microsoft Visual C++ redis, and when you want to uninstall it, you leave all dependencies behind, because of course there is no easy way of finding them.
You make it all seem like it takes an eternity while in reality it's a matter of about 5 minutes at worst. The Visual C++ redistributable shit literally never happens anymore since Windows 7 became a thing, any worthwhile installer installs it automatically just like your package manager would.

>(and tech illiterate people will likely get malware in the process by downloading it from the first google result)
>tech illiterate people will likely run rm -rf /* in the process by reading it on google when trying to install candy crush

>Config files that are left in /etc/ et /home/user/.config
And /home/user/.programrc
And /home/user/.program/
And whatever the fuck the developer wanted to put in your home directory which ends up growing exponentially to the amount of shit installed and you can't say no to it in most cases

>Nope never, but why would you ever do that ?
Of course you wouldn't, because Linux is a pain in the ass to maintain without one, Windows isn't. That's my point.

>>58225829
What's the point of that?

>>58218356
>>58219659
Then you start using AA, then AB, then...

>>58218356
you can then only mount to a folder on another drive

>>58225966
What happens when the code used to designate the drive letter gets so long that the extra drive isn't big enough to store it?

Yes this is billions of drives

>>58215273
Because crap apps relies on that crap and M$ won't step on crap.

>>58226029
there's no letters beyond Z
once you hit that your only option is to mount to a folder

if you run out of folders you're fucked, i guess

>>58226062
>there's no letters beyond Z
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f488uJAQgmw

>>58226029
Switch to numbers

>>58226128
Use Greek letters

It's a thing from old machines.

The letter C takes the least amount of pixels to show on screen.

>>58226167
I never knew that, what a golden nugget of information.

>>58226302
I'll be toatally honest mate, I pulled that right out of my arse. Made it up.

>>58226302
Brown nugget of information?

>>58215302
First of all, system files are stored in C:\Windows.
Second, having the system files all in the root directory would mean a clusterfuck.
Third, I believe you meant to talk about the boot partition, instead of the boot drive? You can actually install the OS on the same partition as the boot partition, but it requires you do some extra steps during install; namely you need to open up command prompt during the window install process and either format your entire drive, or format the partition you want to use as 4k cluster size, set it as the active partition, and then format all other partitions with cluster sizes that are not capable of containing the boot partition data (like 64k cluster size). None of the other partitions should be flagged active. Then when you choose the formatted 4k partition windows will install both the OS and the boot partition to that one spot.
But that's a silly thing to do, because it's much easier to recover your OS installation if you separate the boot partition from the OS partition.
Fourth, it's what people are used to.

why fix what aint broken?

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>>58226636
Here's the image that the poster of >>58226636 deleted.
>Why can't you rename drrives
>Has named drives in pic

>Why can't you organize drives in a meaningful way
You're using list view, you idiot.
Switch to details view. You can even customize the columns and use those columns to sort the drives in meaningful ways.
If you're talking about windows auto-arrange, you can disable that aswell. Even in details view. It requires some registry tweaking...but it's fairly easy to do because there are already scripts online that do it for you.

>>58225834
A country that still uses IE, Fax and floppies in 2016.

Same reason why they use backslash as path separator.

>>58224175
This is false. Floppies were abandoned immediately after CD media was released. You had to be retarded to keep using the most inferior storage option. I haven't seen anyone use floppies after 2000.

>>58215273
Because even though the reason it used to be done isn't relevant any more, there's really no legitimate reason or benefit to changing it. You're asking "Why does Windows still install on C drive?" when you should really be asking "Is there any reason why it shouldn't?".

>>58227212
Floppies & zip disks were still used well after software started being released on CD, since for quite some time CD's were not writable on a consumer level.

>>58227516
Majority of consumers had no reason to write to them and still don't, same applies to floppies. You'd usually only burn a CD for either piracy or backups, and only a few people cared about this.
As for floppies I haven't seen one in the last 15 years. CDs were better, larger and quickly adopted. You'd only use them if you were one of the companies cucked into ordering masses of floppies instead of waiting for CDs.

>>58227718
So between the times when CD media was introduced and USB flash drives were introduced, people had no reason to transport computer files. Got it.

>>58227894
>using floppy disks to transfer files
>ever
Kek

>>58227124
Are you implying that any of these things aren't used elsewhere? Or that these are in any way exclusive to Japan?

Apart from Fax, which is somewhat more common in Japan, IE is still used by numerous business and enterprises users, but floppies? What on earth are you talking about? Aside from very legacy systems and legacy industrial computerized machinery no uses floppy normally, maybe with some rare exceptions.

What makes you think they are commonly used in Japan? Where on earth are you getting your information from?

ITT: aspergers

>>58227212
I was using floppy disks to transport CAD files to & from college in 1999-2000, along with everyone else in my CAD classes. CD-RW was not a viable medium at the time as they were quite expensive and most school computers only had CD-ROM drives, and USB flash drives didn't really come about until 2002 or so.

>>58228143
How else was one to transfer a file between a home PC and a school/work PC? Black magic?

>>58226775
The drive names aren't considered in the sort, see how the Z is in the middle?

And if you actually tried you'd see it's impossible to comment the drives despite Microsoft listing it as an option.

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>>58215380

>>58227212
Floppies were still used for delivering documents and essays in schools and offices. CD-RWs were impractical, USB drives took a long while to drop in price and it made no sense to burn a re-writable disc just to deliver a 18KiB .doc file.

You're full of shit, kid.

>>58228153
>Where on earth are you getting your information from?
The fact Windows 7 (2009) was released on floppies in Japan.

>>58228493
What a crock of shit. No, it wasn't. What the fuck are you on?