Could Windows Make Major Changes to How it Works?

[Sir Topham Hatt]

I was reading about RAID and remembered that A and B are reserved for floppy drives.

Most people don't use these any more - in fact, many people don't have any optical drives at all!

Can Windows not be installed on the A drive these days?  And even encourage Windows to be on a drive all by itself - Windows on A, programs/games on B, or give the user a choice with this?

 

Then it blew my mind - does Windows need to have lettered drives at all?
Why not numbers?  Or is that just change for change sake?  Letters for external drives, numbers for internal?

I guess networking has to be considered here.

 

In a similar vein, I was looking at the old C:\Program Files and wondering when installing things, sometimes these installers create other folders, sometimes it's in the Program Files directory, plus the Start Menu shortcuts and such.  Further thinking

 

Then I was playing around in the registry and wondered what most of this stuff is really doing.  How much is there for legacy programs and such?

 

Could Windows stop with legacy stuff and have a completely new system layout?

For most games and programs, they could update to the new system and anything really legacy, wonder if Windows could have a special "virtual" space to run them in until manufacturers update.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Could it?  Sure, but... why?   Legacy?  They'd still need some sort of mappings and setting storage.

[JustGeorge]

For general home use, whats the need to overcomplicate things by going to UUIDs and BS like that? Out of everything else that could be improved, its pretty minor.