Hi again,
I will be working on this from a test server and if it's successful and the security risks are viable then we'll apply this same technique to the production server.
I have modified the php.ini file to include [PATH=C:\My_Moodle_Directory] and when I compare the phpinfo values for localhost and for this directory I do see the differences between the local and master values for max_input_vars settings. When I restart the server and launch Moodle I will get an error stating a 'database driver problem detected' and 'Microsoft Drivers for SQL Server for PHP are not installed or not configured properly'. I've checked and the drivers are good on the test server and when I comment the [PATH=] in php.ini and restart this problem is gone.
Any idea why Moodle may be behaving this way or how to proceed for here?
Thanks again.