What is the best way to manage / organize / install / move programs between multiple drives?

[phat_gat_masta]

I have a 500GB SSD that I like to store programs I frequently use or ones that need to the best performance. My other drive is a 2TB HD. I store stuff I don't care so much about on there, like video files or programs that load quickly enough already and wont benefit from an SSD.

Sometimes I no longer use a program as frequently and want to get it off my SSD. This is really annoying to deal with as there aren't any great options or tools (that I know of) for saying "hey move this over here and keep everything set up correctly." A lot of programs tend to place files all over the place when installed and it's difficult to make sure everything gets moved.

The other issue is when installing new programs, you can specify the install directory, but often times the installation will create files and folders on your default drive. I REALLY hate this. For example, I had installed Microsoft SQL Sever, specified my secondary drive for all paths, but lo and behold, it created a new directory under C:\Program Files.

What I want to know is how can I EFFORTLESSLY keep things organized and overcome the above mentioned annoyances? How do you guys deal with this? Is there any program that can help?

 

[13thmonkey]

You can't.

Symbolic links might help, but certainly not effortless.

 

[ss202sl]

There's a program written for Steam that creates symbolic links and easily allows you to move programs.

http/www.traynier.com/software/steammover