Windows 10: Can't Delete Windows.old folder or subfolders.

After doing an In-place Reinstall of WIndows 10 X64 to fix update problems. I ran the Clean Windows Files Program to Delete all 'Old' Windows Folders & files. All seemed to go well until I looked at C:\ dribve and see that Windows.old still exists. I've tried everything to delete it; ven had Microsoft support log onto my PC and they couldn't delete the Directory and all sub-directories there-in. After Microsoft logged out I see now that the Directory viewed under Command Prompt shows as...
C:\Windows.Old.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}> In other If i do words, If do a change directory as C:\>cd Windows.Old I get... The System Cannot Find The Path Specified. If I do... cd Windows.old.* it changes to the long name as above??? When I open the C drive and just try to delete what's listed only as Windows.old, it says Could Not Find This Item.This is no longer located in C:\. Any ides how to delete this would be appreciated!
UPDATE
Just now Realize This is GOD MODE that was renamed Windows.Old Not sure how that happened so I guess the Old Windows Files did get deleted and somehow this God Mode got put in my C: drive named as Windows.old. NOW, how do I get rid of this or turn it off or whatever?

All that happened was the Folder, sub-folders and programs withing got Properties changed to Hidden,


:)

 

Very worried about Windows.old wipe out in 30 days

I upgraded to Windows 10 and a lot of things were missing. Two questions about Windows.old:

• Windows 10 deleted nearly everything on my desktop. I went into Windows.old, found them, and dragged them to the desktop. Now it looks normal. But, oddly, they are not in Windows 10's official desktop folder. Since they are visible on the desktop and
  no longer in Windows.old, is there anything else I need to do? It would be a total disaster if Microsoft deleted my desktop items forever after 30 days.
• In Windows.old, there remains content in these subfolders: Program Files, Program Files (x86), and WINDOWS. Windows 10 wiped out Acrobat Reader and other programs. Should I drag all the content in these three Windows.old subfolders into the respective
  regular folders on my C: drive before Microsoft wipes them out after 30 days?

 

Files deleted from windows old folder

Hi Vinod,

I had Windows Vista. When I installed Windows 8, it transferred my data to a folder called windows.old. After I installed Windows 10, it created another folder called windows.old.000. At that point, I had no idea that my data from there will be deleted automatically
after a few (30 days what I read in the forums).

As of now, I can find both the windows.old and windows.old.000 folders and subfolders but none of my data/documents are there.

Is there any way I can retrieve that data?

 

How do I remove the Windows.old folder?

 

Go to properties of C:, Disk cleanup, Clean system files, apply, yeah check selected files, get a cup of coffee.......

 

Disk cleanup will not remove a directory called C:\Windows.Old.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}.

No idea how you got in this situation. I suppose they renamed it for you my mistake.

What you can do is take ownership. From elevated cmd prompt try this (exactly as it is, don't replace %USERPROFILE% with your name or anything). Code: takeown /f "C:\Windows.Old.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}" /r icacls "C:\Windows.Old.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}" /grant "%USERDOMAIN%\%USERNAME%"F) /t[/quote] Then try to delete it.

If that doesn't work (sometimes there may be driver files that are locked) you can try safe mode (go into msconfig > boot tab > select Safe boot and reboot. Then try deleting it again.

Note you'll not be able to see the contents of the folder through file explorer. Because of the name you'll just see the god mode links. If you want to see what is in it you'll have to look through command prompt. Deleting the folder however deletes the correct contents - not all of the control panel links you see in explorer (I just tested it).

 

If you create a live linux drive , by getting an iso and 'burn' it to a usb stick, using rufus, then it is easy to delete such files/folders.

I use the tiny puppy linux drive (Download latest Puppy Linux release) for doing this sort of stuff.

 

Hello wings4kites Welcome to the Ten Forums!

The last two were both good posts there! Another more manual method I was using here wouldn't be the Command prompt but still taking ownership of the lower sub folders if any first to see those removed and then work backwards up to the main Windows.old folder with the rename there. By eliminating the subs you only have the main to deal with which is much easier to see removed by itself. The Take Ownership reg mod to see that option added onto the context menu is available in the guide for this. Take Ownership - Add to Context Menu in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

Now for booting live in a distro you may still run into some problems at times even when nothing in Windows is running as far as removing system created folders. Most distros may even prompt for your password in order to continue despite being in a completely different OS while this typical with Puppy, Ubuntu, Debian, Open Suse, etc. Mephis and Gentoo were always a bit smaller then Puppy Linux but not very Fat16, Fat32, NTFS friendly at all. Knoppix live for DVD as well as live ubuntu and later Linux Mint ubuntu or Debian based seeing less prepackaged features are popular choices.

Regardless you may want to check the contents of the user account sub folder in case you missed seeing something backed up before tossing the newly renamed Windows.old folder away entirely. There's always that chance that...?

 

He said in the first post. The directory is called C:\Windows.old.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

Try it - make a directory called "C:\NightHawk". Put some files and directories in it.

Then rename it "C:\NightHawk.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}"

You will understand the problem.

 

And that is precisely why you first have to be able to get inside of it and remove the contents being you can simply remove or change the name on it again. If you simply nuke the main you may not end up removing the contents within but simply end up hiding the renamed Windows.old! Seen that happen where the only way to nuke some folder that lost the name was to reformat the drive or partition it was on! Work on the contents first and then see the main taken care of!

 

No, you are wrong. File explorer doesn't show what is inside. It shows what is defined by the name.

I tested it. You (I am fairly sure) didn't.

Try making a new folder, put some files inside and then renaming it to put ".{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}"on the end - you will see. You will see "God Mode" shortcuts through "file explorer" and you will see whatever you put there through dir via the command prompt.

 

Let's see first create a new folder inside aww yes the existing Windows.old seen on the test build's 7 side's 10 VM there that just saw the latest 14267 build upgrade over the 14257 and what happens when going to delete the new folder which was renamed after copying a bunch of wav files into it?





GONE IN A FLASH! So that isn't quite the problem the OP is seeing is it? Something else has a grip on it especially if the Control Panel icon is on it where when you click on the folder itself the Action Center opens instead?

cereberus had a made a good suggestion as far as trying the removal while ubuntu or Debian based distros tend to be more Windows friendly at times then others and those tend to see more recommends for data recovery while Puppy Linux has also been used as well.

The Take Ownership option has been used going back to XP while it was Vista that first saw the Windows.old folder introduced. I have had to remove a good number of them over the years manually where taking ownership simply going into the subs first saw the entire folder removed much sooner.

Yet a fast right click to uncheck the "Read only" box and another right click to choose the delete option saw that folder in the Recycle Bin on the spot as well as without even doing that. So if you are unable to open the renamed folder to view the right click to uncheck that box is a fast move there to see it end up in the Recycle Bin followed by emptying that. No traces of the renamed folder to find later.

Of course another right click to rename it back by simply removing the extension added once the read only box is unticked and applied as being done on a 10 VM at the moment as well as also having been tried on 7 as well. What are test builds for? *Nerd

 

So Everyone!!!! Thanks for all the suggestions. Here's what's going on. The actual Folder is GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}. Which it is now renamed as. (need to make sure the period is there just after GodMode). This is the GodMode that exists within Windows 10 (other OS), that shows everything you can do/access to tweek or get to in Windows System So if you create a new folder as GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C} then click on it you will see that it opens a whole bunch of links to access anything withing the windows realm. So here's the problem (for me at least), If I right click on that folder, the try to delete it, it errors out saying this is no longer located in Drive C:; yet it's the only place that it is showing and it can be found (used Search Everything). So if someone want to try duplication what I have, create a new Folder on C drive and name it exactly the same... GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C} After that just click on it and see all that's within it that can be done. Then, I would think you should just be able to right click that same folde and delete it? In my case it says it no longer is on Drive C... but the darn thing is! I even created the folder a second time and it said it already exists do yu want tomerge the two folders... I click yes and it merged new and old and just added a second string of the last characters... GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C - ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}. So then I tried to delete it and all it did was return it back to the original shorter name. Also, the folder contents are read only and I tried to change that if it would help but it does not let me. So if someone creates this same folder and tries it (everything works that's now inside it), let me know if you can just delete your with a simple right click and Delete. Then I must have some unique problem that says mine ios no longer on C althoiugh it sure is!!

 

I tried this and it errors on first command with... Cannot find file. Which is same as tryi9ng to delete directly. Says it's not in C drive yet it is.

 

If you want to explain what you did I'll look into it.

If you want to just dump loads of copy/paste onto this forum then you can wait.

Grow up mate. Make your question:

• Short
• Simple
• And say what you tried already

And press the <enter> key

Do try to make some sense - it helps.