WinRAR: Access is Denied when archiving

Question

I am trying to backup an old drive from a WinXP machine in Windows 7 using WinRAR. I keep getting "Access is Denied" in a lot of the folders I'm trying to include. I don't really want to go changing file permissions on the drive. Is there a way to get WinRAR to ignore file permissions?

Answer 1

You could try using Robocopy with the /B switch to ignore the file permissions and copy the files to your backup drive. You'll need to run Robocopy with an administrator/elevated command prompt for this to work.

It won't compress the files of course, but you can always do that after copying the files and stripping the permissions.

Answer 2

If your OS is preventing you from having access, and you're in an administrator account, the folders are likely limited to the SYSTEM user, which is a user you can never log into or run applications at. As such, WinRAR will never be able to side-step such things.

What you may want to consider instead is booting into a LiveCD environment, such as Ubuntu or OpenSUSE. Ironically enough, I find that the LiveCD environments have better access to NTFS partitions for XP, Vista, and especially Windows 7. If you want to side-step the permissions and archive large folders, this is the way to do it.

I find that in Windows 7, copying profiles and other things with "limited access" or require administrative access to authorize copy, are really crummy in terms of copying performance, and accurate feedback of progress. This is specifically when doing it in Windows 7. Doing the same thing, on the same folders in a LiveCD environment not only provides you with proper performance, but also proper progress feedback.

Go Microsoft on your awesome implementation of your own format technology.

Answer 3

When you open WinRar make sure you right click and select "Run As Administrator". even though you are a administrator user programs you run will not have administrator privileges unless you do that.

If the files are still not readable that means either the file is in use and has a exclusive lock, or that the administrator does not have permissions to read. One thing I would recommend is use Total Commander to copy the file before you try coying it. I have used it to copy files that are being difficult. It will elevate itself to administrator privileges if it needs to.