I have a PC and a laptop. They both run XP. On the laptop in the folder C:\WINDOWS there are lots of files. However, on the PC in the C:\WINDOWS there is only one folder (system32) with one file. The PC was upgraded from Win 2000 and has lots of files/folders in C:\WINNT Can someone explain why this is? Is the XP upgrade not installed properly on the PC? It seams to work fine but annoying not knowing why there is a difference. Thanks.

AFAIK, The default directory for DOS based windows, 9x ME, is c:\windows and the default for NT based windows is c:\winnt Wth an 'upgrade' all bets are off. M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

With a clean windows XP install you install to C:\windows (by default) with an XP udgrade, by default, you install to the current Windows directory (which is WINNT with win 2000) It is likely that the windows folder on your PC maybe is leftover from a previous install attempt that was aborted, or it may just be XP being a little odd. But since it's likely that you upgraded from 2000, and accepted all the default options - all the important files will be in C:\winnt rather than C:\ windows /*rambles on.... */

The default directory for DOS based windows, 9x ME, is c:\windows and the default for NT based windows is c:\winnt Not true. The default directory for Windows 2000 is C:\WINNT. The default directory for XP is C:\WINDOWS.

yeah was puzzled at the dos vs. default path install myself as neither ME or XP are considered DOS based (neither have a true Dos prompt, rather simply a command prompt by default) and yet BOTH of these non-DOS based programs install default to c:\windows.

No they don't. Windows 2000 defaults to C:\WINNT

think you mis-understood. "both" was in reference to ME and XP which will default to C:\Windows. Yes you are correct, I know Windows 2000 will install default to C:\WINNT Thanks.