By default, Oculus software is installed in system C: drive. There is a solution to move Oculus Rift installation, games and applications to another drive without reinstalling.
Oculus VR, acquired by Facebook in 2014, is an American technology company specializing in virtual reality. In 2012, Oculus released the Rift, the very first virtual reality headset designed for video gaming. However, the Rift has some shortcomings. One of them is storage space problem. By default, the Oculus software is set to install on the system drive, which is typically the C: drive. What’s worse, the Oculus Rift apps and games can’t be downloaded and saved to different drive but directly go to the drive where the Oculus software is installed.
Nowadays, most users have replaced their HDD with a faster SSD by migrating OS for better performance. But a SSD is usually smaller, and it will be easily running out of space after installing several Oculus games. Then, is there any way to move Oculus to another drive?
Fortunately, the latest update allows users to install Oculus to another drive so that Rift owners are able to download more games and apps without having to worry about C: drive full. However, if you have already installed Oculus, the steps to uninstall and reinstall the updated Oculus are more complicated than a fresh Oculus installation. But there are two solutions to move Oculus to another drive without reinstalling Oculus software. Let's have a look.
Solution 1: Move Oculus to another drive with Mklink
Notes: This solution is not official, and Oculus software may not work after being changed to different drive, so use at your own risk or go to Solution2 .
Step 1: Press "Ctrl + Alt + Del" to open Task Manager. Then locate "OVRService" and stop it.
Step 2: Open the drive (here is D:) where you would like to move Oculus games and applications. The drive must be formatted with NTFS and not be a network drive.
Step 3: At the blank space, right-click and select "New" -> "Folder". Rename the folder (here is Oculus Rift Games).
Step 4: Open C: drive -> Program Files (x86) -> Oculus. Here you can find folders named "Software" and "Downloads". Copy both the "Software" and "Downloads" folders to the "Oculus Rift Games" folder you just created.
Step 5: Delete the old "Software" and "Downloads" folders.
Step 6: Open "Command Prompt (Admin)". Type the following commands and press "Enter":
The commands you type might be different to this example, depending on what you name the folder and which drive you move to. You should receive a message like "Junction created for..."
Step 7: Start "OVRService" in Task Manager.
Then the next time when you download and install games or apps, they will be saved to D: drive. This command only allows you to move Oculus games and apps to another drive, if you want to move entire Oculus installation together with games and apps inside it to another drive, vrBackupper is the best choice.
Solution 2: Move Oculus to another drive with Free vrBackupper
vrBackupper is a free tool especially designed to move Oculus installation directory to another drive, and backup Oculus installation directory or only games and apps inside it so that you can restore the backup after reinstalling Oculus. With its help, moving Oculus has never been so easy.
Step 1: Download, install and launch vrBackupper. It will automatically detect your Oculus installation directory if installed as shown below. You just need to choose another drive or a folder where you would like to move Oculus by clicking the "…" button.
Step 2: Click "Start Move". Here takes moving Oculus from C drive to D drive for example.
Step 3: After Oculus move is completed, please click "OK" to exit. The program will automatically delete original installation directory (Source Location). If Oculus could not be started from the new drive, please restart your computer and try again.
You can also move Oculus to another drive by backup and restore Oculus which also allows you to move Oculus to another computer.
The Workaround: If there are other drives which have enough space on the system disk, you also can use AOMEI Partition Assistant to move free space to solve C: drive running out of space, instead of moving Oculus to another drive.
Tip: vrBackupper only supports Windows 64 bit. If you want to move Oculus games in other systems, please upgrade to Oculus Game Mover.