Folder That Won't Delete

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Fri Apr 21, 2006 4:35 pm

I have a folder and subfolders that won't delete even in safe mode at the command prompt. Does anyone know of a free utility that will fix it?

The Microsoft help is confusing and complicated. I think they want me to make an image of my hard drive, format it and restore from the image.

I think someone mentioned a program on here that fixes that but I couldn't find it.

valis · Post by **valis** » Fri Apr 21, 2006 9:06 pm

Before doing that try changing permissions from an admin acct. Do 'take ownership' and apply to all subfolders & items...

bosone · Post by **bosone** » Fri Apr 21, 2006 11:05 pm

i have the same problem!!!

a file that wont' delete even from the dos 6 prompt (not in windows mode!)
i suppose it is a hard disk allocation problem...

King of Snake · Post by **King of Snake** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 12:31 am

try googling for a progam called "Dr Delete"

helped me out a couple of times.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:09 am

Yes I am aministrator and have permission.

I just tried dr. delete which seems identical to mooveonboot. These programs are designed to delete spyware files.

They didn't work on the folder. My problem is caused by the file system being corrupt. I could just leave it. It's kind of anal of me to spend all this time on this and maybe I will give up eventually. I just love fixing things no matter how minor it is.

Shroomz~> · Post by **Shroomz~>** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:30 am

On 2006-04-21 17:35, braincell wrote:
The Microsoft help is confusing and complicated. I think they want me to make an image of my hard drive, format it and restore from the image.

I think that would probably fix the problem.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:32 am

The only problem with that is what if it doesn't restore? Then I am totally screwed.

I read the thread and tried the 'take ownership' thing. It didn't work. I didn't think it would as I am always the administrator.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: braincell on 2006-04-22 07:33 ]</font>

arela · Post by **arela** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:33 am

tried to move it and/or renamed it?
...a couple of restarts maybe!

Sometimes this things happen, f.i can't delete some folders in the temp directory
- after a while they have to give up

keep on - ordnung must sein!

Shroomz~> · Post by **Shroomz~>** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:39 am

On 2006-04-22 07:32, braincell wrote:
The only problem with that is what if it doesn't restore? Then I am totally screwed.

Exactly

It's really not worth the effort in my opinion. We have the same problem here. At some point we'll just fire a brand new hard disk in their & install windows on it, make it the only boot disk & still have access to anything we need on the old disk. This is how we're currently running, so it would be the addition of a third HD for us. Could always just back a load of important stuff up onto DVD right enough. That way we could just format the disk we're using now & start from scratch.

paulrmartin · Post by **paulrmartin** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:53 am

Move on Boot worked for me when I had that problem.

And it's Free

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 6:57 am

I tried moveonboot. It didn't delete the folders just the files.

MikeRaphone · Post by **MikeRaphone** » Sat Apr 22, 2006 5:18 pm

I don't know s**t about comps, but here's how i got rid of an annoying empty folder on my desktop- i just changed properties to a shared folder and deleted it, and voila... windows work best when closed

Herr Voigt · Post by **Herr Voigt** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 1:58 pm

Last possibility: save all other folders to a safe place (USB-HDD etc.) and format this drive, then copy the other folders back.
Not very tricky, but should work ...
With drive c: you should avoid this method ...

Kymeia · Post by **Kymeia** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 2:11 pm

I had this problem one time and changing folder permissions helped but another time nothing would do it and in the end it turned out to be a bad sector on the HD.

voidar · Post by **voidar** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 2:23 pm

I had some problems like this.

Ended up formating and reinstalling. Was about time. I think my installation was starting to become horribly corrupt.

valis · Post by **valis** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 10:59 pm

On 2006-04-22 07:32, braincell wrote:
The only problem with that is what if it doesn't restore? Then I am totally screwed.

I read the thread and tried the 'take ownership' thing. It didn't work. I didn't think it would as I am always the administrator.

The problem is that permissions sometimes get screwy (or sometimes apps will create a file/folder and its only given system-level permissions, like with spyware). However if its corrupt to the point where nothing is working, I would perhaps manually edit it out of the file system (there are still tools to do this) then do a scandisk (repair/fix etc) and/or use another disk-scanning & repair tool.

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 1:37 am

It may not have anything to do with permissions, but with 'file in use' flag. I once reformatted a partition just to get rid of a big file, nowadays i delete those files from a networked linux machine over Samba... (windows file sharing)

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 1:39 am

to reset a folder's permissions, i like to create a new folder next to the other one, select both, go to security and it will say "permissions are different, want to reset?' That seems to do the reset properly on folders causing problems...

valis · Post by **valis** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 2:09 am

paulrmartin · Post by **paulrmartin** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 5:35 am

On 2006-04-22 07:57, braincell wrote:
I tried moveonboot. It didn't delete the folders just the files.

Strange, it worked for me.