Windows 8 administrator privileges re: deleting a file from a hard drive

kasfig

Well-Known Member
Dear forum
Please may I have some advice. I have windows 8 cp installed .
I have a hard drive connected to a hard drive caddy, and am using it as an external hard drive: and it contains various audio/text/video files, and these were added to the hard drive when I was using windows xp
Now, however I find some of these files are "locked" onto the hard drive - I cant move them anywhere else.
If I try to do this I get the message that I don't have administrative privileges to do so
I have tried disabling uac but it situation still the same.
My Pc has only one user account (mine) and I am of course, the administrator accordingly.
because I installed windows 8 myself with just me as only user.
Your kind help would be appreciate
Ian
 
Hello and welcome to the forum.
As your new installation of Windows 8 is unaware of the security identifiers that were present on the machine your external hard drive was formerly attached to you may find it necessary to "Take Ownership" of either the files and folders that are causing you problems or the root of the entire drive.
You can grab a copy of the program that will add this ability to the right click context menu from here Add "Take Ownership" to Explorer Right-Click Menu in Win 7 or Vista - How-To Geek
Regards
Randy
 
Dear Sir
Thank you for this help
I shall try it out (take ownlership) and get back with results

Hello and welcome to the forum.
As your new installation of Windows 8 is unaware of the security identifiers that were present on the machine your external hard drive was formerly attached to you may find it necessary to "Take Ownership" of either the files and folders that are causing you problems or the root of the entire drive.
You can grab a copy of the program that will add this ability to the right click context menu from here Add "Take Ownership" to Explorer Right-Click Menu in Win 7 or Vista - How-To Geek
Regards
Randy
 
Simply taking ownership may not be in itself enough. You may also have to grant your user account full control (NTFS Permission) under the security tab in the file properties.
So pick a problem file, right click it and choose properties, select the security tab at the top and examine the Group or user names: to see who has what in the way of permissions.
Try adding you account explicitly and see if that helps, click edit, then add, then advanced then find now, select your username and click OK, back in the permissions properties box make sure your name is selected and Full control is allow(ed).
If for some reason you are not able to do this because some selections are opaque or grayed out, then you will need to break inheritance from the parent container.
Good luck and keep us posted.
Randy
 
Dear Sir
Dear Randy
Your kind help is most appreciated.
The problem files concerned were actually files I had previously downloaded or created using dvd rip software.
Consequently I finally decided to re-download the files and re-create the iso file.
In this regard I finally deleted the problem files.
Thus, the problem is solved.
However I have had this problem in the past , and it is not always possible to get files lost in this way back.
Therefore, with your kind permission, I have bookmarked this webpage, as I feel it will be invaluable in the future.
For now though
Thank you and kind regards
Ian
 
@Adamsapple1, It looks like your link helped a great many people. Unfortunately I wasn't one of them. It seems that administrators do not have permission to change permissions. I tried running the reg file; making suggested changes and rerunning the reg file. I wound up just resetting everything back. It just wouldn't work for me.
I sometimes make, or install files that Windows recognizes as "System Files". When this happens, Windows takes over the file, and I cannot modify, or change it in any way. As an administrator, I don't even have permission to change the permissions of these files. While I understand MS does not want people mucking around and accidentally crippling the system, there is sometimes a valid reason, (or sometimes not so valid whim) to go into these files by knowledgeable, or semi knowledgeable people. While locking these files (on the surface.) seems like a good Idea, there must be a simple way to unlock them. I cannot imagine anyone silly, or self centered enough to lock administrators completely out of the system files.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks.
Scott

It's my network, I'll crash it if I want to.
 
I find it funny when I have file problem in Windows 8 like this guy that switching to Apple OS X fixed the issue by telling what the problem is, but Windows 8 gives me no hint as to why I am having a problem. Honestly the error reporting in Windows 8 has gone down hill in success. You would think as the OS progresses it would get better at a return of information but the opposite is not true. Windows 8 returns less information and no longer give any indication of the problem or how to solve it. An example is it sends me to a site that has nothing to do with the issue, but OS X gave the correct evaluation. Not that Mac OS X is better but really Microsoft has gotten worse. Maybe they will see this and fix the issue.
 
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