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Message started by Brian on Oct 10th, 2007 at 3:45am

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by Brian on Oct 10th, 2007 at 3:45am
bilsch,

I don't have an explanation for why this happened. We all like to blame Roxio.


Quote:
Before now I was able to hide partitions from XP by changing the system byte (in the partition table) to type 83h (Linux), type 82h (Linux Swap), type17h (Hidden NTFS), type FFh (Hidden), etc..  That doesn't work any more.  Windows Explorer shows all of them.  

Have you tried removing the drive letters from Disk Management?  


Quote:
Windows XP keeps a list of visible partitions. With XP's Disk Management snap-in the drive letters can not only be changed, they can be "removed", rendering those partitions inaccessible to programs. Removing the drive letter is not the same as hiding the partition. Removed drive letters can be "restored", but a partition hidden from XP will not get a drive letter and will be inaccessible to XP (the OS will know something's there, but won't be able to manipulate it). Hidden partitions still show up in XP's Disk Management console, where they are typically identified as "Healthy (Unknown Partition)".

If a previously-hidden partition is newly visible when XP boots, it will be recognized and given a new drive letter. Once a partition is visible to XP it is recommended that you do not subsequently try to hide it from XP with a boot manager or PartitionMagic. Instead, use XP's Disk Management snap-in to remove the drive letter if need be.


http://www.goodells.net/multiboot/notes.htm


Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by NightOwl on Oct 11th, 2007 at 2:05am
Brian

I saw *bilsch's* original post!!!  Looks like s/he must have deleted it after your post!?

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by Brian on Oct 11th, 2007 at 8:00am
Didn't like my reply?

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by bilsch on Oct 12th, 2007 at 2:21pm
Hello.  I deleted my original post because I was going to rewrite it and post it differently.  But before I had time to repost I found something in the ROXIO forum that fixes it- actually klooodges it.

Here is a I sent that will explain the fix.  I think it is an interesting subject.  And I don't have a final answer yet.

THIS IS AN UPDATE ON AN EARLIER POST:

I found some info searching archives at ROXIO forum. Other ROXIO users had similar problems.

MY PROBLEM: After installing/uninstalling EZ CD-DVD Creator 6 on my XP Home System, all of the 'hidden' type partitions on my HD were being listed in Windows Explorer - which never happened before. The solution I found in the ROXIO forum is to use XP's MOUNTVOL utility to remove 'mount points'. It works. GREAT ! However this solution actually seems like a klooodge. I still have some lingering questions.

I mentioned previously that there is a 'MountedDevices' registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices
that has two types of entries, as follows:

1) entries containing the word 'Volume' followed by a hex number.
2) entries containing the word '\DosDevices\' followed by a drive letter.
Type 1 entries correspond to partitions listed in the 'disk management' utility
Type 2 entries correspond to volumes listed in Explorer

Hidden volumes will have a Type 1 entry but should not have a Type 2 entry.
At least that's how it looks to me - however my system is broken, so maybe I'm getting the wrong idea.

When I perform the MOUNTVOL klooodge a new type of entry (Type 3) appears in the 'MountedDevices' key:
Type 3 entries consist of a '#' sign followed by a hex number.
Type 3 entries correspond to mount points that I removed using MOUNTVOL.

I never paid attention before my problem started, but maybe 'MountedDevices' had all 3 kinds of entries before this problem started. Maybe I lost the Type 3 entries when the system got broken - and now I have to use MOUNTVOL.

QUESTION 1: does anybody have all three kinds of entries in 'MounterDevices' ? Have you used MOUNTVOL ?

QUESTION 2: where in XP are the decisions being made that control which entries get put in 'MountedDevices' ?
I would like to find that place and fix the problem there - instead of using this MOUNTVOL kloodge.


Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by NightOwl on Oct 13th, 2007 at 9:52am
bilsch


Quote:
I found some info searching archives at ROXIO forum.

Could you share link(s) so we can see what is being recommended?


Quote:
The solution I found in the ROXIO forum is to use XP's MOUNTVOL utility to remove 'mount points'. It works. GREAT !

Where do you find *XP's MOUNTVOL* utility?


Quote:
QUESTION 1: does anybody have all three kinds of entries in 'MounterDevices' ? Have you used MOUNTVOL ?

To my knowledge, I have not knowingly use MOUNTVOL, unless it has to do with the tray icon that brings up *Safely Remove Hardware* dialog box--usually for attached USB devices--I have used that!  But, I have one entry that starts with the *#* symbol in my registry, along with the other two types of entries.


Quote:
QUESTION 2: where in XP are the decisions being made that control which entries get put in 'MountedDevices' ?
I would like to find that place and fix the problem there - instead of using this MOUNTVOL kloodge.

Not sure.  I do know that, for different reasons than why you are looking at these registry entries, I have deleted all these mounted device entries--and on the next re-boot, WinXP re-scans the HDD(s) and re-establishes those entries--so it happens at the *System* level.  (By the way, don't go editing the registry unless you have made backups--just in case so you can recover from a bad edit!)

If you use *Disk Management* to change drive letter assignments, that will cause this registry key to be changed as well!

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by nbree on Oct 13th, 2007 at 5:13pm

NightOwl wrote on Oct 13th, 2007 at 9:52am:
Where do you find *XP's MOUNTVOL* utility?

It should be a standard part of an XP install, just like FSUTIL.


Quote:
But, I have one entry that starts with the *#* symbol in my registry, along with the other two types of entries.

That's understandable if you think about what the purpose of such an entry might be. When the volume management components of the OS looks at a drive and enumerates the partitions within it, it has to decide what to do with each one. There are three main outcomes:
a) if there is a remembered drive letter mapping for the item, mount the filesystem and make it available (through the \DosDevices area of the NT kernel namespace, which is these days a symbolic link to the \Global?? directory) on that drive letter,
b) if the partition has not been seen before, to assign a new drive letter mapping for the drive (important for removable media, and a sensible think to do for nonremovable media), or
c) if the partition has been seen before but the user has specifically asked for the volume to not be assigned a drive letter, don't assign a drive letter.

Regardless of the tool you use, the mount manager will be using this type of entry to remember not to assign the partition a drive letter in future.


Quote:
I have deleted all these mounted device entries--and on the next re-boot, WinXP re-scans the HDD(s) and re-establishes those entries

Indeed. This is a fundamental part of the device-driver system; just as the bus enumerator drivers are used to find all the potential attachment points for devices, there is a part of the kernel that scans the devices for filesystems and tries to recognise what kind of filesystem driver stack to mount on top of the device.

Actually mounting a filesystem in the kernel and assigning it a drive letter are slightly different things (drive letters exist in the kernel object namespace under \Global?? as symbolic links to the names of the underlying device object nodes), since drive letters are more properly part of the Win32 personality than the underlying NT Native API, but the two are pretty intimately connected and the distinction is mostly academic unless you spend a lot of time operating at the native level.

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by bilsch on Oct 16th, 2007 at 6:52pm
Hi.  Thanks for more info.  I've been away and couldn't log in.

The MOUNTVOL solution actually is not very good.  My system is BROKEN.  It 'mounts' all volumes regardless of everything.  The trick to my procedure was that volumes were hidden from XP on the first reboot after their creation - that way XP couldn't mark them, couldn't write history about them.  To use the MOUNTVOL solution requires booting the broken system that sees everything - that's too late, damage already done.

What I can't understand is why M$ doesn't have the mechanics of this documented so we would know where to go, what to look for, etc.  This is Bullshit.  My system is broken.  I will have to reinstall it - and if this happens again I don't know how to fix it, therefore I can just reinstall it again.  M$ designs their stuff so you can only use it in such a way that tends to make more money for them and the friends they have purchased or intimidated into cooperation.  If I could get my hands on them I would give their fat ass a good hard kick over and over and over and over and over . . .

Title: Re: WinXP Explorer showing partitions that should be hidden.
Post by Brian on Oct 16th, 2007 at 7:16pm
bilsch,

Out of interest, if you remove a drive letter in Disk Management is that drive letter reassigned to the same partition after rebooting? Or not?

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