Home (/) / Windows (/Category/Windows/)

How to install Windows apps on

an SD card or USB drive
Windows 8 won't let you install the apps found in the
Windows Store to external storage--but you can force the
matter.
Eric Geier (/author/Eric-Geier/) | @eric_geier (https://twitter.com/eric_geier)
Contributor, PCWorld

Jun 5, 2015 9:30 AM

In the past few years, weve seen a wave of new inexpensive Windows tablets and laptops,
starting with the release of Windows 8. But as you may have found out the hard way, these
lower-end tablets and laptops usually offer little internal disk space: as low as 32GB and even
16GB in newer models. Since Windows and basic software can easily take up double-digits
worth of gigabytes or more, there is typically little or no room left for extra applications, games,
photos, documents, and other personal files.
Though you can usually pop in a MicroSD card or a flash drive to get more disk space, you
wont find a way in the graphical interface to have the modern-style Windows Store apps
which can consume a ton of disk spaceinstall onto removable storage. However, it is
possible with a registry hack in both Windows 8 and 8.1, giving you another way to help
conserve your internal disk space.
When running apps off external storage like this, keep in mind you should try to use the
fastest, highest performance SD card thats supported by your device. Ensure you get the
right-sized SD card as well. Most tablets take the small MicroSD cards, but not the larger,
regular-sized SD cards.
If you prefer to use a USB flash drive for extra storage space, try to get one that supports
USB 3.0, the fastest USB version yet. Also, consider a mini low-profile drive that doesnt
extend out of the USB port much, to prevent accidental damage when using or storing your
device while the drive is inserted.

Prepare the SD Card or Flash Drive

Though any SD card or flash drive should work for storing your Windows 8 apps, it needs to
be in a certain file system format, called NTFS. To check yours, pop in the card or drive, open
a File Explorer window, find your removable storage, right-click its icon (or long tap for touch
screens), and select Properties.

You can see the File System listed near the top of the drives Properties window.
If your card or drive isnt in the NTFS format, you can easily change it. However, first ensure
you have copied any existing files on that drive to another location before proceeding, as
changing the format will delete all data on that drive.
Once youve backed up any existing files on the card or drive, you can format it by rightclicking the drives icon (or long taping for touch screens) and select Format. On the Format
dialog window, ensure NTFS is selected for the File System and that the Quick Format
checkbox near the bottom is selected, and then click Start.

(https://cmsimages.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/drive_format100589029-orig.png)
Formatting your drive with the NTFS file system.
Even if your drive is already formatted to NTFS, you may want to create a new folder on the
drive that will hold the data for your Windows 8 apps. Simply open a File Explorer window,
navigate to the drive, and create a folder, perhaps naming it Windows Apps, Win8Apps, or
something else to help you identify it. Inside this folder, Windows will create a sub-folder for
each app you install in the future.

Change the registry setting

In order to change the location where Windows 8 apps are installed, you must first give
yourself (or more technically the Administrators of Windows) ownership and editing
permissions of the corresponding registry key. To get started, open the Registry Editor: go to

the Start Screen, type regedit, open the program in the search results, and follow these
steps:
1. In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following location:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Appx
2. On the left side of the window, right-click the Appx key (or long tap for touch screens)
and click Permissions... and then.

(https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/access_permissions-100589025orig.png)
Accessing the Permissions of the Appx key.
3. On the Permissions window, click the Advanced button.

(https://cmsimages.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/access_advanced_permissions100589022-orig.png)
Accessing the Advanced Permissions of the Appx key.
4. On the Advanced Security Settings dialog, click the Change link on top, next to
TrustedInstaller.

(https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/applying_ownership-100589026-

orig.png)
Opening the window to change ownership.
5. Type administrators into the box, click Check Names, and click OK.

(https://cmsimages.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/changing_ownership100589027-orig.png)
Changing ownership of the Appx key to Administrators.
6. Near the top of the Advanced Security Settings dialog, select the Replace owner on
subcontainers and objects checkbox and click OK.

(https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/applying_ownership-100589026orig.png)
Applying ownership changes to all settings of the Appx key.
7. Back on the Permissions window, select the Administrators entry from the list, for Full
Control select the Allow checkbox, and click OK.

(https://cmsimages.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/allow_fullcontrol100589024-orig.png)
Allowing full control of the Appx key.
8. Back on the main Registry Editor window, double-click the PackageRoot entry on the
right side of the window.

(https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/define_location-100589028-orig.png)
Finally, heres where you define the location where you want Windows 8 app data to reside.
9. Type the location of the desired drive or folder you created earlier and click OK.

(https://cmsimages.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/06/example_location100589031-orig.png)
In our example, were storing Windows 8 app data to a folder on the SD card, which is the E
drive.
10. Reboot your device to ensure the changes are applied.

Move old apps to the new location

The registry hack we discussed will only affect apps you install after the procedure.
Previously installed apps will remain at the old location. If desired, you can move these
existing apps to the new location by uninstalling them and then installing again from the
Windows Store. Keep in mind though, you may lose any previously saved data and settings
for apps that you move.
We discussed just one method to help free up internal disk space on your Windows tablet or
laptop. If more space needs to be freed, perhaps get rid of unnecessary items: uninstall
unused applications and bloat-ware, clean out temporary files, and delete old documents and
files. Also, consider coping the Recovery Partition of the device to an external drive and delete
it from the internal drive.
PCWorlds guide to maximizing storage on a storage-deprived Windows tablet
(http://www.pcworld.com/article/2360120/how-to-maximize-storage-space-on-your-windowstablet.html) has more info if you need it.

Related:

Apps (/Category/Apps/)

Windows 8 (/Tag/Windows8/)

Eric Geier Contributor

(http://www.facebook.com/EricWGeierWriter)
(https://plus.google.com/10410217179684249397)

Follow @eric_geier

Eric Geier is a freelance tech writer as well as the founder of NoWiresSecurity, a cloud-based Wi-Fi
security service, and On Spot Techs, an on-site computer services company.
More by Eric Geier (/author/Eric-Geier/)

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Rosabelkoll0

11 hours ago

Thanks for your nice introduction! Irecently try to install a game on my phone SD
card and really get a errorproblem. I dont know why. Perhaps, Id better try your way
and take a chanceagain.
http://www.icare
-recovery.com/howto/
sd-card.html
Like Reply Share
lmrks

0
5 days ago

Hi Eric,
Thanks for this useful information..
Just want to add one thing, that i received this error after doing these changes: Error
Code: 0xd00000bb
which i fixed using this:
I have fixed 0xd00000bb error, by adding NT SERVICE\TrustedInsta
ller full control
toE:\WindowsApps. But all the preinstalled windows store apps stopped working, just
initial screen and then nothing (Unable to start a Dcom Server: AppexMaps ...).
Like Reply Share
HaiYingYzm4p

0
28 days ago

Something is wrong from step 4 onwards. I couldn't follow. Pls check and correct
your mistakes.
Like Reply Share 1 reply
Aaron Bottegal

0
27 days ago

PEBKAC.
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