Thanks stahta01 and gd_on for your replies.
There are many C compilers and C IDE's for Windows, as I'm sure most people know (eg Borland C/Lcc/TDM/PellesC/TinyC/DelphiC++Builder/MS Vis Studio with cl.exe/MinGW/Cyqwin/Quincy and others!).
When I started C compiling on my Win8 PC I opted to install Cygwin with GCC/G++ compilers & with the cyqwin path in my Windows env variables I can compile C programs from Windows console and use my present favourite all purpose IDE, Geany4Windows.
I do like to try other IDE's and I also program in other languages (Java/Perl and web develop with PHP JavaScript etc etc). I am always looking for good (ie easy to use & maintain IDE's & dev environments for my programming on my Windows PC) which can use general IDE's for many languages or IDE's specific to languages eg CodeBlocks for C/C++. Any editor or IDE that makes programming easier is worth trying for me! Many C/C++ IDE's now come with C compilers included but others do not. I have not ever installed MinGW on my PC from the MinGW homepage but I have had two installs of MinGW (C:\MinGW and C:\MinGW4.7.1) added when I have installed other C IDE's.
It is no wonder that conflicts can occur in programming on Windows if care and understanding is not taken!
My issue here has been how CodeBlocks C/C++ IDE installls and works. For me as I had tried other C IDE's on my Win8 PC before installing CodeBlocks I had this very significant error with installing & using CodeBlocks (eg perpetual error message about "inserting disk" and no libxxxx.dll).
The information on the CodeBlocks downloads page for Windows binaries is good. From the download page:
NOTE: The codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup.exe file includes the GCC compiler and GDB debugger from TDM-GCC (version 4.7.1, 32 bit). The codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup-TDM-GCC-481.exe file includes the TDM-GCC compiler, version 4.8.1, 32 bit. While v4.7.1 is rock-solid (we use it to compile C::B), v4.8.1 is provided for convenience, there are some known bugs with this version related to the compilation of Code::Blocks itself.
IF UNSURE, USE "codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup.exe"!
Maybe the C:\MinGW folder I saw on my C drive appeared after I used either codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup.exe and/or codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup-TDM-GCC-481.exe as I used all of the binaries at one stage in an attempt to fix this problem! (with uninstalling each one in turn & then installing the other but for me the fix was when I deleted the C:\MinGW folder from my C drive before reinstalling CodeBlocks setup.exe). I think it more likely to have been added by another IDE I had installed previously (but I'm not sure which one ?NetBeans?).
As CodeBlocks is now working for me I am not going to uninstall it now & repeat the other installs to check this for myself! I've spent enough time with this & now I want to try CodeBlocks as it is working for me at last.
I might just add if there was a bit more of an explanation to clarify the advice
IF UNSURE, USE "codeblocks-13.12mingw-setup.exe"!
that could be useful!
Finally as far as using Link Shell Extension goes I appreciate the information and I agree it maybe useful but I will not try it just now as I am happy with my C compiling setup and want to try CodeBlocks first (but I may look at Link Shell Extension later if I feel the need!).
I hope my experience here may help anyone else who unfortunately may experience this same problem and now I look forward to trying CodeBlocks. Thanks and best wishes and happy C/C++ programming to all! :-)