External HDD question
 

Recently fitted and copied C: to a partition on same.

If I switch it on when the computer is up and running it immediately starts loading files from it until I cancel the activity!

I've searched for autorun files and the only ones found are inside folders, so why is it doing this? Power it up before the computer and this doesn't happen (as with an autorun CD that's already in place at powerup).

This is default Windows XP behaviour for anything it classes "Removable Storage", which includes all USB devices. What I typically do is install the Microsoft TweakUI PowerToy, and fix that and some other things.

I hesitate to ask: why copy the whole of C: to it? If you know where your data is, you'd be better off just backing up the data. A full copy from C: is not a good backup strategy - you're copying a lot of system stuff that's no use to you in the event of a problem.

"Why copy the whole of C:"

I used the utility that came with the HD in order to copy all system files as well as applications. Oddly though, my C: drive has around 40gig on it but the 'backup' has only around 27gig !

I have TweakUI but not used it for yonks - off to refresh my memory!

Thanks.

You shouldn't need tweakui -

In My Computer, go into the device properties for each type of removable drive (they need to be physically present), open the Autoplay tab and associate Take No Action with each type of content.

A tedious process, but possibly worthwhile.

SD