It’s always a little frustrating when there are features built into other operating systems that sound like a good idea, but they’re not available as standard in Windows, no matter how big or small. One of these is a small but useful feature Mac users and also users of some Linux distro’s have, is the simple but useful ability to have a shortcut icon automatically appear on the desktop when a removable drive or CD/DVD is inserted into the machine. It’s pretty logical to assume that at some point you are going to want open the drive up and having an icon there for you to quickly and conveniently do so is a simple thing but can be quite useful.
Like most useful functions, if it’s not built in to Windows, there is third party software around that can do it for you. The situation is no different in this case, and a freeware utility by the people at Tweaknow can help. Driveshortcut is a simple to use but effective tool that performs the task of putting the shortcuts for a number devices on the desktop when they are inserted. And when the said devices are removed or ejected, the shortcut icons disappear again.
The program is a little over a 2MB download and once installed, consumes around 1.4MB of memory so can comfortably sit in the tray without causing any problems.
There is only the configuration window which needs to be set up to your liking to get things going. There are five different types of drive that you can select to appear, these are; CD-Rom drive, Removable drive (pen sticks, portable hdd’s, cameras, phones etc.), fixed drive (internal hdd’s), network drive and a RAM drive if you have one.
The other two options available are whether you want to let the program start with windows or not, and if you want the program to remember the position of the drive icons that appear. Useful if you want to keep the drive shortcuts on a different area of your desktop away from the program shortcuts. Make sure to click ‘Save’ to register the changes.
It will then sit and wait for one of the drives it is watching for to be inserted, and display the related icons when required.
Tweaknow Driveshortcut is a useful little utility that does exactly what you would expect it to do. It does have a problem though, and that is there are already similar utilities around that can already do what Driveshortcut does and more besides.
Compatible with Windows XP, Vista, Win 7 and Win 8
Desk Drive is one alternative to Tweaknow Driveshortcut and has a number of differences. Firstly, the program is distributed in separate 32bit and 64bit installers but each is only around 500K. Once installed and settled it was using around 800K of memory. Do be aware it does require .NET 2.0 or higher to function and make sure to select the ‘Advanced’ installation so the opt-out toolbar can be disabled.
This program can also handle CD-Rom, removable, fixed, network and RAM drives, but has a few extra features of interest. A small animation zoom effect can be displayed over a drive icon that has been inserted so you can easily spot it on the desktop, and an Explorer window can be set to open whenever a drive is inserted. There is also a box where you can exclude specific drive letters from being monitored meaning they won’t be affected by the program. Note the comma to separate drive letters in the box. The ‘Minimize all windows’ option will do just that when a new icon appears on the desktop, an option that’s a bit frustrating when you forget about it and a window you are using suddenly disappears because a new drive has been inserted!
Compatible with Windows XP, Vista and 7 32bit and 64bit
Download 32bit | Download 64bit