deleting failure due to access denied - seeking advice

On Monday 11-15-2010, I replaced my back-up notebook PC's (Dell M1330) hard drive (HD) and reinstalled the Windows Vista Home OS from the original Dell re-install CD. Due to inability to find some needed drivers, I repeated the install process twice before eventually locating them. As many/most of you know, when the Windows OS re-install process is repeated, the previous code and files are not overwritten, but shunted into a Windows.old.000 for future access on the hard drive. As this file occupies considerable space--about 7-8GB--I tried to delete it, but received an error message stating I need permission to do so. I've attached below a JPEG file of the screenshot of this message. I tried the right-click mode on this screen and also activated the "try again" several times, both to no avail. I also tried deleting the individual subfolders/subfiles in the Windows.old.000 file, but encountered the same message obstacle. I am the only user of my PC and set up my username and password as the administrator, which I thought would allow me to delete files without needing "permission".

I would greatly appreciate any suggestions to be able to delete this file. Do I need to somehow indicate to the PC some other way I am the administrator of this PC?

Thanks for reading and any responses.

 

you may need to take the ownership of the directory(and everything under it). The ACL of those objects are tied to the old installation.

 

Thanks for the suggestion. I apologize for being obtuse, how do I take ownership of the directory?

 

Right, either take ownership and delete it OR view the file from an OS that doesn't care.

Check out Ultimate Boot CD or Parted Magic, which is contained in UBDC. From Parted Magic you can view the hard drive contents and delete the files with no worry about ownership.

 

right click -> property -> security -> advance -> owner

 

Thanks much for the responses/suggestions.

Indrek-I followed your informative and detailed instructions to change ownership and confirmed ownership passed to me for the Windows.old.000 folder. However, when I tried delete to delete the folder afterwards, I received the same message and denial. Any thoughts as to why the PC is still demanding permission to delete the folder?

In case I can't subvert the permissions situation, I'm considering the Ultimate Boot CD suggested by Anseio or even reformatting the hard drive to erase the old OS code and reinstalling the OS over it (after saving the updated drivers, including the drivers for the WLAN wireless card).

Thanks again,

 

Indrek--The disk cleanup tool worked perfectly to delete the previous Windows installation, thanks much. I didn't realize previous Windows installations are regarded as a separate entity in the disk cleanup options. Thanks also for your other detailed and thoughtful suggestions, they may be useful for future situations and problems.

Thanks also to all who responded. I'll keep the Ultimate Boot CD in mind for future applications.

 

Glad you got it working. Indrek's tip was awesome, so be sure to +1 for it.

Do burn the UBCD to disc or to a very small flash drive (if your lappy is able to boot externally via USB). It's very handy to have just in case there's a true disaster and you don't want to lose data.

 

Thanks for the suggestions, I wasn't previously aware of the reputation counter that forum members contribute to and am glad to know about it--+1's given.