Member Avatar for ablindingnight

hi everyone.
i'm having a problem i've never run into before. i'm running microsoft windows xp home sp 2. my girlfriends computer running the same thing crashed, and i'm trying to move her important files (my documents) onto my hard drive to back up. her hard drive is in my computer right now. i have access to everything except her folder in documents and settings. when i double click the folder all i get is 'access is denied'. i know why it's doing this but not how to fix it. and my parents didn't pay the extra bucks for xp pro like i asked them too. if anyone could help it would be greatly appreciated!!

thank you!!

-=ted

ps. i know on windows xp pro you can disable simple file sharing interface in folder options, and then take ownership of the folder. but i have HOME. more like homo. jk.

  • 2 Contributors
  • 3 Replies
  • 120 Views
  • 6 Hours Discussion Span
  • Latest Post Latest Post by antioed

Dani AI

Generated

Nice troubleshooting by and good call by —this thread has the core points. A few practical notes and clarifications that help turn that “access is denied” into a reliable recovery plan.

Safe Mode worked because it allows use of the built‑in Administrator account and lets you access the Advanced security UI that Home normally hides. That account can reset ACLs and ownership on another NTFS drive, which is why was able to “snag the permissions” there. Be aware that changing ownership/ACLs on a copied profile can break some profile-specific settings, so target just the user data (Desktop, My Documents, Favorites) rather than rewriting the whole profile unless needed.

If the files were encrypted with EFS, permissions changes won’t help: EFS ties each file to the user’s certificate/private key. An easy check is the file Properties -> Advanced attributes (the “Encrypt contents to secure data” checkbox) or the Explorer color cue when enabled. Encrypted files require the original user certificate (or a domain recovery key) to decrypt; without that, the data cannot be recovered by changing permissions alone.

If Safe Mode/owner reset is not an option, two safe fallbacks: create a full disk image first and work from that (so nothing gets damaged), or boot a Linux/Live USB with NTFS support and copy unencrypted files off the disk (Linux ignores Windows ACLs). For encrypted files, locate any exported .pfx/.p12 backups of the user certificate or check whether a domain recovery agent existed—those are the only realistic recovery paths.

These points explain why the Safe Mode trick often works, what will stop it (EFS), and practical alternatives to preserve and extract the important data.

Recommended Answers

All 3 Replies

Member Avatar for antioed

Sounds like there might be encryption on her user account? Once you make that drive secondary you should be able to take ownership over all files on it unless the files are encrypted.

- Use Computer Management-->Storage-->Disk Management to see if that partition is NTFS
- check out these docs: http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/encrypt_overview.mspx?mfr=true

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/encrypt_overview.mspx?mfr=true

Member Avatar for ablindingnight

thanks! i think that would have worked too. but i went into safe mode, and then under the folder properties i was able to snag the permissions.
i appreciate it though!

Member Avatar for antioed

Oh good - glad you got it!

Be a part of the DaniWeb community

We're a friendly, industry-focused community of developers, IT pros, digital marketers, and technology enthusiasts meeting, networking, learning, and sharing knowledge.