Windows within Windows

[Richard]

Exploring my D drive, where XP Home is installed, I find within the Windows
XP folder another Windows folder which also contains a lot of XP files.

Running a program to find duplicate files finds several thousand . Typical
paths are D:/ Windows/xxxx. with duplicates under D;/ Windows/ Windows/xxxx.

Is it normal to have a Windows folder within Windows and all these
duplicates ? If they are not supposed to be there would it be worthwhile
deleting them ? I would also like to know how the duplicates might have
occurred.

Richard.

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi Richard,

No, it's not normal. Any chance that your reinstalled Windows at some point?
It shouldn't be harmful to leave it as is (winxp does not suffer from the
same dll hell as did earlier versions of windows).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

 

[Richard]

Hi Richard,

No, it's not normal. Any chance that your reinstalled Windows at some point?
It shouldn't be harmful to leave it as is (winxp does not suffer from the
same dll hell as did earlier versions of windows).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

I did have a problem a while back and I did a repair install which got me
going again. Since then I checked out my system back up by restoring
everything to a new hard drive . I don't know at what point the extra XP
files were created.

As everything is working normally even with the duplications I may well
leave things as they are. However since I have a backup image of the
complete system I am tempted to have a go at deleting the extra XP files or
possibly just renaming the Windows within Windows folder or even deleting it
to see what happens.

Richard.

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi Richard,

Start/run cmd

From the prompt, run PATH

This should tell you where the system files are seen to be.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

 

[Richard]

Thanks Rick.

I get PATH =
D:\WINDOWS\System32;D\WINDOWS;D:WINDOWS\System32\WBEM;C:\WINDOWS.000;C:
WINDOWS.000\COMMAND I am getting lost !! What now ?

Richard.

..

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi Richard,

Then it looks like the \Windows\Windows folder is the errant one.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

 

[Richard]

Hi Richard,

Then it looks like the \Windows\Windows folder is the errant one.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

Hi Rick,
Whilst there is no problem running my system as it is, I can see some
advantages in clearing out the duplicate Windows files.Various housekeeping
jobs such as virus scans, running AdAware and backups etc.should be speeded
up. So I will make a note how long these tasks take presently and double
check my backups before finally attempting to delete the Windows within
windows folder and it's contents.

Thanks for your help. I will report back the eventual outcome.
Richard.

 

[Richard]

Hi Richard,

Then it looks like the \Windows\Windows folder is the errant one.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone

Rick, Thanks again for pointing me in the right direction. Deleting the
errant Windows folder went without a hitch. It has got rid of a total of
41,885 files as counted by my virus scanner. Sixteen minutes has been saved
in the time taken to run a virus scan and I am sure other housekeeping tasks
will also be speeded up.


I will raise a glass to toast your expertise )

Cheers! Richard.

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

You're welcome, glad to have helped. I'll drink a beer in your name (ok, so
I'll drink a beer in anybody's name, but it sounded good).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone