Can you move the community folder to a different drive?

I f I start downloading all the new scenery I will run out of room on my SSD. I would like to use my other drive for scenery. Can you move the community folder? Or can you us a symbolic link for folders stored elsewhere? Will a simple shortcut to another drive work?
I guess I could test this…but if someone know that would help.

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Yes you can. Just cut and paste the Microsoft folder to your new drive and launch the game. On checking for updates, as it can’t locate the current files, it will let you select the new location to the folder.

You can also move the app launcher location by going to Settings > Apps > Apps & features > search for Microsoft Flight Simulator and then click it and select Move.

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Symbolic links works. I use it here.

Thanks, good info.
I actually answered my own question. I downloaded Godzilla from MFS addons since I knew it wasn’t there normally. I created a folder on my D drive and created a symbolic link in the community folder that points to the Godzilla folder on the D drive. The magic worked! Next I’ll try a simple shortcut as that is much easier to create. I assume that will work too. I’ll have to see how much longer it takes scenery to load as the D drive is not an SSD. The little file I used as a test is not a good one to check loading times.

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I had no luck with simple shortcuts

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The manual way:

Open C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\UserCfg.opt

Change the path in the last line of this file, and move your installed packages (the folder containing the folders Community and Official and all their subfolders) there :slight_smile:

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Any content you purchase should be placed on MY hard drive. Let me know when you want to upload to me.

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CM edit: Link removed due to it being marked as unsafe.

  1. Move your community folder where you want it
  2. Hold right mouse and drag community folder in to packages
  3. Select Drop Here → Symbolic Link or Junction

You can do this for any folder and it won’t be able to tell the difference.

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I’d like to move some of this community to a different drive, that’s for sure!

I’ll get my coat.

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Same, i use symbolic link. Works perfectly

Me too, works for everything you want to put in the community folder. Sure saves my SSD and space on it.

I have a 500gb SSD, so basically if I follow those instruction’s I can leave the main game on the SSD drive and move the community folder to my larger drive

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Yes, but you will find out, you don’t actually move the community folder, just everything in it.

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In my sustem, when trying to move or copy the Community folder, I’m getting a “Your othanization does not allow you to…”. Any ideas?

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As far as I know, you can’t.
This is the next best way that I know of.
In this way, you put your addons in a different folder,
and put a symbolic link in the community folder.
It works very well.

Thanks. I’ll try that. Do I need the empty the Community folder?

You can do whatever you want. A symbolic link is just that, a pointer to a directory that actually exists somewhere else, but to the program looking at the link in Community, it thinks it’s the whole directory. A symbolic link is different from a shortcut. Google it yourself, but here’s a description of how to create one.

https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/16226/complete-guide-to-symbolic-links-symlinks-on-windows-or-linux/

So basically, whatever directories you want to reside on a different drive, you’d copy them there, delete them from the Community directory (some of you will have encrypted Community directories that limit your ability interact with files there. Typically, it won’t let you move an encrypted directory in my experience, because it wants to stay encrypted. Basically, if it’s in the default location in WinApps, it’ll be encrypted. If you installed it somewhere else, like D:\FS2020, then it won’t be.) and create the link inside the Community directory to the new location. So you can choose to move some or all your directories in Community and create links to them. It’s up to you.

Thanks. I think it’s time to move it to a bigger partition while still early and still have minimal 3rd party add ons.

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I don’t have that file in the path you listed. I will try to just move the folder and see if MSFS is smart enough to ask for it’s path. Thanks for contributing!

Just do a search for it - you shouldn’t have too many files with that name on your disk :slight_smile: