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A few weeks ago the fan in my laptop (HP Pavilion dv6) died. I took my computer apart to test the fan, which had definitely burned out, and ordered a new fan.

In the meantime, there were files on my computer which I needed, so I connected the hard drive to a USB device which allows laptop hard drives to be used like USB external drives and connected this to my mom's computer (also an HP, but this one Windows 8). When I tried to access the drive, it said that I did not have permission to do so, so I attempted to take ownership of the drive and various folders. I have been using a registry tool which adds a button to the context menu to claim ownership of a folder and its contents or a file. I know it was stupid and I suspected there would be problems later on, but I needed the files.

When I put my computer back together, it started up out of hibernation like nothing had happened and worked perfectly. However, after rebooting it did a disk check, apparently deleting some registry items and emptying the recycle bin.

I found, after this, that some locations on my hard drive were now inaccessible to me and programs running on my computer.

Some programs have stopped working. Constant Guard, a necessary evil my dad installed on my computer to supposedly prevent viruses, mercifully forgot that I had a license for it, giving me a good excuse to uninstall it. Dropbox stopped synching with the servers. Microsoft Word no longer auto-saves, reporting an error every time it tries to do so with increasing frequency until the document is essentially unusable. Chrome stopped working entirely (would not start) and refused to be updated or uninstalled. I manually mangled out the installation until it would finally reinstall and now works fine. Torch, a derivative of Chrome, was not similarly affected. Python 3.2 quit working entirely, but works after upgrading to 3.4.

My question is this:

How can I claim ownership of every folder, sub-folder, and file on my drive or simply turn off file protection? What other issues may be causing these symptoms (registry corruption?) and how do I fix them?

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  • Maybe you try takeown command from Command Prompt? For example, use takeown /F LostFolder /R /A (/R for subfolders and files, /A for giving privileges to Administrators group, and not user). Type takeown /? for more info. And tell us results.
    – Jet
    Apr 26, 2014 at 17:38
  • Should I takeown C: or just a single folder? I want some way to fix this in one single, simple action, not going through folders I have lost access to as I have been doing...
    – Void Star
    Apr 26, 2014 at 17:54
  • On further inspection, the registry tool I have been using utilizes takeown.
    – Void Star
    Apr 26, 2014 at 18:01
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    I would recommend you to takeown all folders except system folders (such as "C:\Windows", "ProgramData", "Users", "Program Files") because playing with them can create security issues. Or maybe you give those system folder's ownership to TrustedInstaller (as it is by default)? But be careful.
    – Jet
    Apr 26, 2014 at 18:10
  • Whats stopping you taking ownership of the drive the "regular" way? Ie Right Click, Properties, Security Tab etc? May 31, 2014 at 12:30

3 Answers 3

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The solution I eventually used was using the command line takeown command and, using some registry fiddling, putting it in the context menu, so I could right click on any folder and take ownership. I muddled through this way for about a year until the computer started bluescreening for no apparent reason. This is all to say, the following solution is a bad one and you should probably just reinstall the operating system instead: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/add-take-ownership-to-explorer-right-click-menu-in-vista/

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I understand that the disk whose permissions you modified is the system disk.

The system disk contains special folders with very special permissions that might have been lost. In addition, the computer account you used in your Mom's computer might not have its equivalent on your computer, so your folders might now be owned by a phantom account that doesn't exist on your computer.

For your own folders (non-system), you first need to verify that you are actually the owner and if required re-take ownership.

The next step, if special permissions on system folders were mangled, they need to be restored. I don't know of a way of restoring these special permissions, except by a Repair Install to Fix Windows 7, to fix your currently installed Windows installation while preserving user accounts, data, programs, and system drivers.

How to repair Windows is explained in detail in the above linked article, but read the article carefully and with special attention to the Warning section.

If this is not enough, then more drastic action might be required, like reinstalling Windows and all applications from scratch.

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  • Hello, I am eager to try this but finals are coming up and I'm swamped. Thanks for the answer, it looks promising, and I will get to this as soon as physically possible.
    – Void Star
    Jun 1, 2014 at 17:06
  • Ensure you have backups of all your data before starting. And good luck.
    – harrymc
    Jun 1, 2014 at 17:32
  • The bounty is going to expire soon but I just do not have time to fix this right now. When I am able, and if this works, I will figure out a way to award the bounty. I'm simply swamped with work right now.
    – Void Star
    Jun 6, 2014 at 7:56
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With an account with elevated privileges, you can change the ownership of files using the file explorer. Select a folder to check permissions. On owership, it would be nice to give ownership to the administrator group. When you connect to another machine, it will recognize the group owner.

Also on the ownership screen there is an option to replace owner on all sub-folders below it.

After ownership change, you can update file permissions to what you desire.

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