Windows creates the folder Windows.old on a PC running Windows when you upgrade the PC to a new version of the operating system.
The Windows.old folder contains files and folders of the old installation of Windows, and the main reason it is there is that it is used to restore the old system if the user wants to go back to it.
This folder may take up a sizeable amount of space, but will get deleted automatically usually by Windows after a set period of time.
Windows users may also use the disk cleanup tool to remove the folder as described here. Sometimes however it happens that the folder and its content is not removed, and that a manual removal does not work either.
When you try to delete the folder manually in Explorer, you get permission errors as the folder is associated with SYSTEM and not a user or administrator account.
What happens usually is that you get a permission request first to run the operation with administrative privileges, and then the Folder Access Denied error.
You need to run the following commands remove the Windows.old folder manually.
Lets take a closer look at the commands to better understand what they do:
takeown /f c:\Windows.old\* /r /a /d y
Takeown can be used to make the administrators group the owner of a file or directory.
cacls c:\Windows.old\*.* /t /grant administrators:f
This command displays or modifies DACL (discretionary access control list) files.
rmdir /s /q c:\Windows.old
The command removes a directory.
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if on domain may work bit different, can rt click folder properties-security-advanced-change permissions.
then where it lists owner click change and use domain admin acct.
click the replace all child object box.
then apply, ec then delete.
have had to do it to 15 or so of them lately..
Bastante para ahora–
takeown /F C:\Windows.old\* /R /A
pause
cacls C:\Windows.old\*.* /T /grant administrators:F
pause
rmdir /S /Q C:\Windows.old\
pause
Copy-paste this in Notepad and save it as a .bat file.
worked well for me thanks @ jasray
Boot from a Linux live cd / dvd, go te the folder where windows.old is located, delete it, done
I’ve seen another method where you run Disc Cleanup and it deletes it.
Yes, Disk Cleanup deletes it usually, but there are situations where this won’t work, or where leftovers remain.
Yes, disk cleanup deleted the files but not the folder. When I tried to delete the folder manually, I got the response that the file was corrupted and unreadable. I searched the Web for an answer, which was to use Chkdsk. When I did that, I was told that the file was in use by another program(?). I was asked if I wanted to run Chkdsk on the the next restart. I answered yes, and restarted. Chkdsk worked seemingly very quickly, and when I tried to delete Windows.Old, I got the same response. I repeated the process, and this time Chkdsk worked more slowly. Then I was finally able to delete Windows.Old.
The Chkdsk command that I used from an administration account was chkdsk C: /F. I tried another version using /B but it did not work. This was on Windows 8.1.
LoHa
command 2 answered:”Zuordnungen von Kontennamen und Sicherheitskennungen wurden nicht durchgeführt.”
What to do?
aloha
I used Google to search the German phrase and translate the result to English. Perhaps https://community.norton.com/de/forums/zuordnungen-von-kontennamen-und-sicherheitskennungen-wurden-nicht-durchgef%C3%BChrt-vista-32-gho-0 will help from Norton.
“Zuordnungen von Kontennamen und Sicherheitskennungen wurden nicht durchgeführt ”
Meaning:”Assignments of accounts and security-states are Not altered.”
“Zuordnungen von Kontennamen und Sicherheitskennungen wurden nicht durchgeführt”
Meaning: “Assignments of accounts and security-states are Not altered.”
Thank you
Worked like a charm. Keep up the good work
Thank you! This worked perfectly where windows.old would not remove through all other methods.
_____THANK_____YOU !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I wrestled with this for about an hour. Cortana would not give up the ghost.
I rebooted into safe mode, and applied your fix, and WINDOWS.OLD is now GONE !!!!!
It worked!
Thanks.