Change Windows Default Installation Directory

Windows installs programs in C:\Program Files directory by default

• You might want to change it if your C drive is running out of free space.
• Some programs may not give you the option of chossing your directory upon installation
• This should work with Windows XP, 2000, Vista and Windows 7 (I haven't checked Windows 8 yet).  

Guide

• Check your free space on your planned default directory (You may also want to consider the speed of the drive)
• I use a solid state drive for my OS, my main programs (Antivirus, MS Office, Adobe, and whatever game I am playing at the time)
• You need to do a small registry change
• Type “regedit” in start menu search box (or the Run box for XP) and press the "Enter" key
• Navigate to the following registry key in the Registry Editor HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion

• Locate the value named “ProgramFilesDir”
• Change the default value “C:\Program Files” to your new directory path (address)

• Close the registry editor
• Reboot your system to apply the change

Manually Clear Print Spooler of a Stuck Print Job

Printer frozen or can't delete queued job

1. Click "start"
2. Type "Run"
3. Type "Services"
4. Open "Services" Program
5. Scroll down the list in the right pane and find "Print Spooler"
6. Right-click "Print Spooler"
7. Select "stop" (This will stop the computer running the process that holds print queues)
8. Minimize the "Services" window (Or just leave it open)
9. Click "Start"
10. Select "My Computer" (Opens Windows Explorer window)
11. Note: You've stopped the queue service, now you have to clear the jam that is already there
12. Navigate to the print spool folder. Most likely C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\spool\\PRINTERS (Yours may be slightly different)
13. Note: Windows may warn you that you are about to view system files.  Click "View files anyway" message and find the "spool folder"
14. Open the "Printers" folder

Completely Remove Printer Drivers from Windows 7

• Right clicking on a printer and deleting doesn’t remove the printer driver from your computer
• When working with print servers and testing multiple drivers you may need to completely remove a driver package
• Windows Vista &Windows 7 have a tool called the Microsoft Management Console (MMC)

Step #1

1. Restart
2. Login as “Administrator”