Buzz
When plugging in a USB drive or external hard drive on a Windows 10 computer, these drives will be displayed as separate drives in the Windows Explorer navigation pane and also as a separate entry nested within This PC. Therefore, in some cases, Windows Explorer displays the drive twice even though they both lead to the same address.
If you want the Windows Explorer window to look cleaner and only want the external hard drive connected to the computer to be displayed in the This PC menu. All you need to do is fix the issue of Windows Explorer displaying the drive twice by tweaking the Registry Editor.
Warning:
Registry Editor is a powerful tool, so abusing or tweaking Registry Editor can lead to system instability, malfunction, and even crashes. Therefore, you must thoroughly understand how to use Registry Editor and
Fixing the issue of Windows Explorer displaying the drive twice
First, press the Windows + R key combination to open the Run command window, then type “regedit” into it and press Enter or click OK to access Registry Editor on your computer.
In the Registry Editor window, navigate to the following key:
Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\NameSpace\DelegateFolders\{F5FB2C77-0E2F-4A16-A381-3E560C68BC83}
The key {F5FB2C77-0E2F-4A16-A381-3E560C68BC83} is located at the bottom corner of the Registry Editor window. Right-click on the key and select Delete.
The shortcut icon will disappear immediately from the Windows Explorer window.
You can choose to perform additional steps to fix this issue of Windows Explorer displaying the drive twice or not. If you're using a 64-bit computer (which most computers sold on the market in recent years are), you'll need to delete another key to hide duplicate drives in the Browse and Open windows that appear when you upload photos to websites.
Follow the same steps as above, and delete the key {F5FB2C77-0E2F-4A16-A381-3E560C68BC83} located at the following path:
Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\NameSpace\DelegateFolders\{F5FB2C77-0E2F-4A16-A381-3E560C68BC83}
By applying the method to fix the issue of Windows Explorer displaying the drive twice as guided by Mytour above, you can rest assured that no duplicate drives will be displayed on Windows Explorer anymore. Wish you all the best of luck!
If Windows Explorer isn't functioning, refer to how to restart Windows Explorer here.
