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A rainy night computer question
Me | 9/27/2024 | Paul R.

Posted on 09/28/2024 3:14:39 AM PDT by Paul R.

Here's a weird one! I have a Lenovo N22 laptop that I use for occasional web browsing, Zoom video chats, etc. No crucial data is kept on this machine. However, I do keep a 128 GB Micro-SD card in the Micro-SD port as a data drive and to house smaller programs such as IrfanView, as the boot drive "C" is only 56 GB. This SD card used to come up as Drive D:\ upon boot up. However, in "This PC" now it comes up as "E", and for "D" there is a little drive symbol, then " ? D:\ ". The shortcuts to programs on the Micro-SD card no longer work, and "?D:\" has no properties, no data, etc., something like I see sometimes on an old USB hub when a thumb drive malfunctions and gets pulled without proper ejection.

Everything is still on the Micro-SD card, the computer just doesn't know to look there to, say, fire up IrfanView. If I manually hunt down an exe file, on "E", the program runs fine.

I'm not sure how far back this happened, but, IIRC it was after an update.

I'm also pretty sure I cannot simply rename the Micro-SD "drive" to "D", but, new shortcuts to the exe files on it should work. Right?

I'd love to install a SSD as a 2nd drive, as I have a couple spares, but, I'm not at all sure the N22 has a spot for them.(?)


TOPICS: Computers/Internet
KEYWORDS: drive; lenovo; n22; update
This machine is too inadequate* to be worth a lot of effort or expense, but, it IS still useful for modest tasks like recording music or low demand web browsing, word processing, etc. :-)

*Simply regularly closing out memory leaks (browser windows that don't fully close) helps a lot!

1 posted on 09/28/2024 3:14:39 AM PDT by Paul R.
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To: Paul R.

*Helps with how much the processor gets bogged down, I mean...


2 posted on 09/28/2024 3:15:40 AM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: Paul R.

And, better worded:

“I’d love to install a SSD as a 2nd drive, as I have a couple spares, but, I’m not at all sure the N22 has a spot for one of them.(?)”


3 posted on 09/28/2024 3:17:13 AM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: Paul R.
What OS are you running?

D drive is usually the backup partition on MS Windows.....

4 posted on 09/28/2024 3:27:54 AM PDT by jeffc (Resident of the free State of Florida)
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To: jeffc

That machine has Win 10 Pro on it.

On most of my machines, “D” is a DVD drive or a 2nd SSD or HD.
Recovery partions are on one drive or another but not separately lettered. (On the machine I’m on now, the recovery partition is on “G”, which physical SSD was the original boot drive, but is now a backup & data drive. There actually is still an old copy of the OS, also Win 10 Pro, on “G”.

The N22 does not have an internal DVD drive. The recovery partition is on the boot SSD, but, again, has no separate letter.


5 posted on 09/28/2024 3:58:11 AM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: Paul R.
I'd love to install a SSD as a 2nd drive, as I have a couple spares, but, I'm not at all sure the N22 has a spot for them.(?)

Just get even a cheap ($2.93) USB adapter for the SSD, while Run diskmgmt.msc to see what it says, and from whence you can change the drive#.

Hope this helps. http://peacebyjesus.net

6 posted on 09/28/2024 4:41:01 AM PDT by daniel1212 (Turn 2 the Lord Jesus who saves damned+destitute sinners on His acct, believe, b baptized+follow HIM)
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To: Paul R.

The tool you want is “disk management” to change drive letters, partitions, etc.

This is one of many sites the leads one to open it: https://www.howtogeek.com/787213/5-ways-to-open-disk-management-on-windows-10-or-11/


7 posted on 09/28/2024 5:17:13 AM PDT by No.6
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To: Paul R.
Assuming some not too ancient version of Windows, reassign drive letter in Disk Management, can be found in Computer Management console.
This machine is too inadequate* to be worth a lot of effort or expense

"It is as you say."

This here: https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/solutions/pd104074-product-overview-lenovo-n22-winbook, implies that it might have a smallish SSD. Might. And maxes out at 8GB RAM. And is extremely coy about exactly what CPU is in there.

Probably not a lot you can do with it. Mint Linux or ChromeOS Flex if you can tolerate the whole Chromebook experience.

8 posted on 09/28/2024 8:40:00 AM PDT by Lee N. Field ("And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise" Gal 3:29)
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To: daniel1212

Well, I can even run a thumb drive, and check it often for problems in addition to frequent backups elsewhere, but that ties up a USB port and then I’m probably “in to” a hub. Not a huge problem, a SSD would likely be quicker and more convenient than the existing (soldered in place) drive, I think than the


9 posted on 09/28/2024 12:59:02 PM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: No.6

Right, I’m well aware of “disk management”, but I’m wondering if MS has done something such that a Micro-SD port cannot be a “D” drive, and is always assigned “E” or higher.


10 posted on 09/28/2024 1:01:36 PM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: No.6

Right, I’m well aware of “disk management”, but I’m wondering if MS has done something such that a Micro-SD port cannot be a “D” drive, and is always assigned “E” or higher.


11 posted on 09/28/2024 1:01:39 PM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: Lee N. Field

Yeah, I should “Belarc it” and I’ll bet that Belarc will say the CPU isn’t much. It tends to get tied up worse than the lowly (these days) 8 GB of RAM! (According to Task Manager.)

Nonetheless, the main “thing” here is the weird, apparently permanent reassignment of the Micro-SD drive, that I did not do. It just seemed very odd.


12 posted on 09/28/2024 1:06:09 PM PDT by Paul R. (Bin Laden wanted Obama killed so the incompetent VP, Biden, would become President!)
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To: Paul R.
To iron out system weirdness:

I would do, first, "sfc /scannow" and "dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth", both from a terminal with admin privileges.

Scour for nasties with malwarebytes free, and adwcleaner.

Then try an "in place upgrade" to whatever your current version of Windows is, to clear it's silly head. (You basically run setup.exe off the install stick for the version of windows you're currently running. The equivalent of the old time "repair install".) All existing apps and settings are preserved.

13 posted on 09/28/2024 3:49:13 PM PDT by Lee N. Field ("And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise" Gal 3:29)
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To: Paul R.
"No crucial data is kept on this machine."

Then back up what you want and whack it, factory reset. Problem solved.

14 posted on 09/28/2024 4:37:14 PM PDT by StAnDeliver (TrumpII)
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To: daniel1212

Any IDE/SATA to USB adapters that cheap? The ones I see are $18+.


15 posted on 09/28/2024 5:29:32 PM PDT by Rastus
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