Hiding Drives

Ever wish you could make one of your computer's drives invisible to anyone snooping around on your system? Well, happy days are here my friend! Whether you have sensitive docs, pictures, or any other private data, this is one of the easiest ways to keep them safe. Keep in mind that you'll still be able to access your hidden drives; you just won't see that they exist in Windows Explorer or the My Computer folder. Back up your registry before you start! 1. Open Regedit. 2. Navigate to one of these strings: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer - this only changes the settings for the current logged in user HKEY_LOCALMACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer - this changes the settings for all users on the machine. You may have to create the key folder "Explorer" manually. 3. In the Explorer key folder, create a new DWORD value by right-clicking Explorer, then choosing New DWORD value. Name the value "NoDrives" (without the quotes). This value defines local and network drive visibility for each logical drive on the computer. All drives will be visible as long as this value's data is set to 0. 4. Following the table below, enter the decimal number corresponding to the drive(s) you want to hide as NoDrives value data. When you right-click on NoDrives and choose Modify, make sure you select Decimal base, not Hexadecimal. Drive Number to hide A: 1 B: 2 C: 4 D: 8 E: 16 F: 32 G: 64 H: 128 I: 256 J: 512 K: 1024 L: 2048 M: 4096 N: 8192 O: 16384 P: 32768 Q: 65536 R: 131072 S: 262144 T: 524288 U: 1048576 V: 2097152 W: 4194304 X: 8388608 Y: 16777216 Z: 33554432 All drives 67108863 If you want to hide more than one drive, you simply add the drive amounts together for a combined total. For example, to hide the D:/ and T:/ drives, add the decimal value for the D:/ drive to the decimal value to the T:/ drive. 8 (D) + 524288 (T) = 524296 To disable all of your visible drives, set the value to 67108863. You must reboot your PC to see your changes.

Code:

Alternatively - A much easier solution to both.

Start > Run > GPEDIT.MSC > User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Explorer
"Hide these specified drives in My Computer"
"Prevent access to drives in My Computer"

Only really works with Drives A, B, C, D.

However if you have tweak UI installed you can pick and choose any drive letter.

Throw in NTFS permissions and user accounts that don't have administrator privilages and you are set.

Of course if you want to truely hide and protect your data - you need to looking into third party encryption.
The HD on my laptop is encrypted for this reason.

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