Deleting unwanted folder

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I have an external 250 GIG HD and recently after working on a video project
that particular folder is 177 Gigs! It will not delete no matter what
approaches I try; without reformating that HD. I don't really want to do
that because I don't have any place to put the files I want to keep. The
problem folder(s) are full of unidentifiable filenames that are definitely
not English and because of that it seems that folder/sub-folders will NOT
delete. I have researched for weeks now via Tips and Tricks Windows XP sites
and nothing works. Immediate replies would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
 
Richard said:
I have an external 250 GIG HD and recently after working on a video project
that particular folder is 177 Gigs! It will not delete no matter what
approaches I try; without reformating that HD. I don't really want to do
that because I don't have any place to put the files I want to keep. The
problem folder(s) are full of unidentifiable filenames that are definitely
not English and because of that it seems that folder/sub-folders will NOT
delete. I have researched for weeks now via Tips and Tricks Windows XP sites
and nothing works. Immediate replies would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
Click to expand...

First of all, make sure to check the disk for corruption, that may be the cause of the strange characters. Use scan disk and
chkdsk. If it is clean, then you should be able to delete the folder without risk.


What is the folder called? Try renaming it. For example, if the folder is
"C:\Video Files\£³r?????æ°blah"<???ôé .#_aµ©\funny vidos"
then open a command prompt (Run->cmd.exe) and use this set of commands:
cdd "c:\video files"
ren *blah* z
deltree /y z

That should rename the folder to "Z", and then delete it along with everything inside it. You could repeat the process for any
particularly stubborn folder in there which may cause problems.


If a folder's full path is too long, for example:

"c:\SomeReallyLongDirectoryNameThatWillCauseProblems\1111111111111111111111111111111111111\22222222222222222222\33333333333333333333
3333\44444\555555555555555555555555555555555555\6\777777777777777777777777777777777777777777777777777777777\8\99999999999999999999\0
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000\aaaaaaaaa\BB"

then the system will not be able to delete it because the full path will not fit into the command's argument. Therefore you would
not be able to delete the folder "BB" in the above example, the system would complain. What you need to do is to shorten the full
path. So, rename "SomeReallyLongDirectoryNameThatWillCauseProblems" to something like "a", then
"1111111111111111111111111111111111111" to "a", and so on. Eventually, the full length will be small enough that you can delete
"BB".


Also, you could get a copy of Jeremy Collake's MoveLatr (http://www.collakesoftware.com/) or Cedrick Collomb's Unlocker
(http://ccollomb.free.fr/). You can use those to have Windows automatically delete the folder on the next boot, before it loads.
 
Great info Alec, but windows cmd.exe will not recognize internal or external
command deltree :-(
 
Richard said:
Great info Alec, but windows cmd.exe will not recognize internal or external command deltree :-(
Click to expand...

What do you mean? Are you saying that it can't find it? Does it say that it's not recognized? If so, then you've got a problem
(maybe corruption, maybe malware.)

Try doing the same thing but instead of "deltree /y z" use "del /s /f z".
 
Ken Blake said:
He has no problem. What he means, and he's quite right, is that the deltree
command doesn't exist in Windows XP. Try it yourself. Or read here:
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...xp/all/proddocs/en-us/dos_diffs.mspx?mfr=true
Click to expand...


Ah, right. Deltree does not exist in XP. I use it from habit, and I've got it in my path from another location. Then, yes
Richard, use "rmdir /s z" or better yet (because it has the option to force deletion of hidden/system/read-only files), "del /s /f
z". If those don't work, then you've got a problem. :)
 
WB said:
Try chkdsk drive: /x
See if delete works now
Click to expand...

That won't work if it's the partition that Windows is on, but you can have it scheduled to do so at the next boot.
 
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