Deleting unwanted / unused files and folders

[Djinni]

I have a small problem trying to delete an old windows install I did about a a while ago to get me out of a hole. I dont even remember what the hole was, but it required doing a temporary install of windows on a "spare" drive, since I had plenty of space free at the time on my media drive I chose that. Trouble is now, I can't get rid of it.





Also trying to change the permissions yields:

[chazus]

From that first picture..

Security > Advanced > Owner > Edit > click Administrators > OK

This should give you ownership permissions of it, and allow you to delete it.

[SpaceDuck]

can you go inside the file and delete anything inside?

can you rename the file?

[Djinni]

From that first picture..

Security > Advanced > Owner > Edit > click Administrators > OK

This should give you ownership permissions of it, and allow you to delete it.

Thanks, unfortunately:

[chazus]

I guess my first question is, what IS that folder? You said a 'windows install' but why is that 'windows install' named that?

[Djinni]

I have no idea.

But if you navigate it:

H:\360733281328991\360733281677884
Has:
4 other similarly named folders and "pagefile.sys (size: 1,245,184 KB)
H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360732593998371
You wind up with "Common Files, Internet Explorer, MSBuild, Reference Assemblies, Windows Defender, Windows Mail, Windows Media Player ...." etc..

In this one:
H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360733265350284
There is "Addins, Apppatch, Boot, Branding, BrowserChoice, CSC, Cursors, DesktopTileResources.." etc.. and whole bunch of stuff I would normally expect to find in C:\Windows

[chazus]

Er, what do you mean 'you have no idea'?

Did you install windows so it was H:\Windows? Was it booting off that at some point? When did the name change?

Also...
H:\360733281328991 is not the name of the folder you have listed in the first one.... so.. even more confused...

[lockblock]

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...ows-old-folder
The above might apply to your issue as well but no promises.

[Fluorescent0]

Seems easier to just backup your Movies folder and format the HDD.

[Iamanerd]

Try this in CMD:

rd /s "\\?\H:\660178281328991"

Exactly how it is typed should work. If it doesn't chances are you have a file system corruption in which you might as well put that movies folder on another drive, format that H drive and then put your movies folder back on. Also you could try burning a Hirens disk and booting in to Parted Magic and removing the file that way.

[Djinni]

Backing up the Movies folder is slightly less than a trivial task, and would require nothing less than buying another 2tb drive. At which Point, I'd probably just get a 4tb drive and back everything up and clean slate the machine. (My ass of a brother decided to download bearshare, when I let him use it to look and apply for some jobs. Ever since he did I've been plauged with niggling problems like my mouse double clicking instead of single clicking.)

Hence why I haven't done that already :-)
(The disk is almost full, and while I've been meaning to get another drive, I haven't bought any new movies for a little while. So I haven't been hit by any space issues yet. But there is less than 35gb left on this and the red bar is starting to bug me.

Try this in CMD:

rd /s "\\?\H:\660178281328991"

Exactly how it is typed should work. If it doesn't chances are you have a file system corruption in which you might as well put that movies folder on another drive, format that H drive and then put your movies folder back on. Also you could try burning a Hirens disk and booting in to Parted Magic and removing the file that way.

Unfortunately I get back: "The system cannot find the file specified."

- - - Updated - - -

Er, what do you mean 'you have no idea'?

Did you install windows so it was H:\Windows? Was it booting off that at some point? When did the name change?

Also...
H:\360733281328991 is not the name of the folder you have listed in the first one.... so.. even more confused...

Sorry, the structure looks like this:
H:\
H:\360733281328991
H:\360733281328991\360733281677884
- H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360732593784195
- H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360732593998371
- H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360732609394932
- H:\360733281328991\360733281677884\360733265350284
- pagefile.sys

I have no idea why the folders are named this way, Its certainly not something I would even have done in my sleep. I'm sure I've probably tried removing them before using FileShredder, various command line utilities, a CentOS LiveCD apparently with little success.

- - - Updated - - -

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...ows-old-folder
The above might apply to your issue as well but no promises.

That managed to free up about 5gb of space... so obviously there was something there. But the bulk of it still remains.

[SoulForge]

I will start off and say I hate you. Other people always get the cool issues that are probably not THAT complex but require a little tinkering to figure out.

By chance is this an external drive you can swap to another PC? hot-swappable SATA perhaps?

Run a check disk on that drive.

Does the structure go any deeper than that? There is a 260 character limit to path's

[chazus]

I'm asking why the image says H:\660178281328991 and you say its H:\360733281328991

[SoulForge]

I'm asking why the IMAGE says H:\660178281328991 and YOU say its H:\360733281328991

I didn't even notice that..........

The plot thickens.

[Tradewind]

Is the pagefile on that installation still active?

[Djinni]

I'm asking why the image says H:\660178281328991 and you say its H:\360733281328991

I see.... I'm just copying the file path from the address bar.

I think the easiest way round this is yet more screenshots.









- - - Updated - - -

I will start off and say I hate you. Other people always get the cool issues that are probably not THAT complex but require a little tinkering to figure out.

By chance is this an external drive you can swap to another PC? hot-swappable SATA perhaps?

Run a check disk on that drive.

Haha lol, Well.... thanks. Your welcome to my problems any time you like.
Its not external, it is hot-swapable, but no one else in the house has a tower I can put it in.
Loads deeper. I just cut it off, because I couldn't be bothered writing out an entire windows folder directory structure.

[Tradewind]

Might also be running into an issue with file name length. What happens if you try to delete some of the deeper nested files through command line rather than the entire tree?

[Teca]

Would this not be a problem with encrypting the contents of the directory? I remember having this problem a couple of years ago and if memory serves me it had to do with encrypting the contents of the directory and later having the user privileges all mixed up.

[chazus]

I'm just wondering why your first screen shot differs from the rest. Did you change it in an attempt to fix things...?

Might also be running into an issue with file name length.

Might be that, too. You could also try renaming the first few files so its like...

H:/A/A/A/Common Files/

[Faithh]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...sk_Cleanup.png

Just click on Clean up system files and then just check them all and press ok.