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Guide: Installation of Oculus Software to Non-System Drives

cybereality
Grand Champion

NOTE: This guide is NOT NEEDED anymore as the setup installer supports multiple drives natively.


WARNING: Some users are experiencing issues with the steps below. You may wish to hold off performing these steps for the time being while we investigate. Thanks.

The team's releasing an update that enables installation of Oculus software and apps to drives other than your system drive (typically, C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus) in one of the first Rift updates (likely the next 2-3 weeks). In the meantime, there is an unofficial workaround you can use to move your existing Oculus software and all installed games to a different drive.

Note that this is unsupported (!) and doesn't have a migration path back to a good state once we release the update in the next few weeks. Also, note that the full OculusSetup.exe functionality (uninstall, repair) won't work if you're using this workaround.

Your destination drive will need the following to be true:

  • NTFS file system
  • Not a network drive
  • Not a removable drive (like a portable external HD)
  • Its drive letter (such as E:\) won't change for any other reason
  • 1.2GB free space (in addition to the size of your installed games)


Process:

  1. Install Oculus using OculusSetup.exe ( www.oculus.com/setup - available Monday morning PST)
  2. Launch a command prompt with admin privileges:
    1. Win 7: Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> right-click Command Prompt, choose Run as administrator
    2. Win 8 or Win 10: Right-click Start or hit Win+X, choose Command Prompt (Admin)
  3. Shutdown the Oculus VR Runtime Service:
    1. Run in the command prompt: net stop OVRService
  4. Move your Oculus folder to another drive while maintaining permissions (as an example, E:\Oculus). You must move the folder using xcopy, or you will break Oculus and risk opening security holes in your system.
    1. Run in the command prompt: xcopy “C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus” E:\Oculus\ /O /X /E /H /K
  5. Delete the “C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus” directory
  6. Symlink your new directory with the old directory location:
    1. Run in the command prompt: mklink /d "C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus" E:\Oculus
  7. Restart the Oculus VR Runtime Service:
    1. Run in the command prompt: net start OVRService
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113 REPLIES 113

cybereality
Grand Champion


TommyEn said:

Would it work to install into an empty "Oculus" folder in "C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus" that has already been symlinked?


That sounds like a bad idea to me. I'd recommend removing the symlink and any Oculus folders prior to installing the final consumer application tomorrow.
AMD Ryzen 7 1800X | MSI X370 Titanium | G.Skill 16GB DDR4 3200 | EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 | Corsair Hydro H110i Gigabyte RX Vega 64 x2 | Samsung 960 Evo M.2 500GB | Seagate FireCuda SSHD 2TB | Phanteks ENTHOO EVOLV

dead4sure
Adventurer
@cybereality Thanks for the info!

LKostyra
Protege
Nice! It's good to know, symlinks are in use and work in this case. 🙂

Still, my CV1 arrives in May, so probably by then there will be a much-needed update already live.
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TommyEn
Explorer




TommyEn said:

Would it work to install into an empty "Oculus" folder in "C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus" that has already been symlinked?


That sounds like a bad idea to me. I'd recommend removing the symlink and any Oculus folders prior to installing the final consumer application tomorrow.


Gotcha, thanks!

DerekSpeare
Adventurer
Does this apply only to games downloaded from the Oculus Store?  Does this apply to games already installed on the user's system such as PCars, Elite Dangerous, DCS, etc. that are used with VR? Or does this apply only to the Oculus runtimes?

It would be strangely odd if folks would have to reinstall all of their existing games. 
derekspearedesigns.com

cybereality
Grand Champion
@DerekSpeare It refers to games and apps downloaded from the Oculus Store.
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DerekSpeare
Adventurer
@cybereality - tyvm!  You're the unsung hero of the oculus forums!  #thumbupx2

So I'd expect that if we just install the runtimes into the default path and press on with our non Oculus store games we're cool. 
derekspearedesigns.com

TommyEn
Explorer
I just tried this. When I symlinked the whole Oculus folder the store wouldn't open afterwards. So I symlinked just the "Downloads" and the "Software" folder. This seems to work fine.

Tankshell
Protege
@TommyEn I had the exact same problem. I just ended up sym-linking the Software and Downloads subfolders instead like you. Works fine.
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maxx11111
Adventurer
tried this the store wouldn't open, so trying to xcopy back and it says invalid number of parameters, also how do you unsymlink