Windows 7: Re-Naming User Folders

Hi all

First post, so fingers crossed! My problem:



I recently bought a pre-owned laptop. The previous owner, Sara, has cleaned out her files etc, but her name remains as a locked folder in user profiles.

* I have created a 'Steve' user name as my default admin user. It does not appear in the user folders, where the Sara, Default user folders are
* The Sara user name does not appear in the control panel under users, but all items I've copied from my external drive onto the desktop ready for installations etc, are in the Sara 'Desktop' folder within the main 'users' folder - if I deleted the Sara user, it will delete all the stuff I've copied across onto my desktop (memory is gone now, but maybe I copied across my stuff onto the desktop before I created my Steve admin user).
* When I paste my favourites folders into the Sara folder, it does not show up when I launch Google Chrome
* I am definitely logged in as Steve, as I can see it on the start menu
* I have googled this, and there's info re copying the data from one user to a newly created non-admin user, but options to copy from Sara user are greyed out.
* I don't really want to do a full re-install over this, but wondered if there is a workaround? I just want to be rid of the Sara user info, and be assured that my Steve admin account is the only account on the laptop.

Many Thanks in advance

Hi, welcome to the forums

The first thing to do would be to copy your personal files from the desktop to a personal folder, Downloads is as good a place as any. That way you can guarantee that the files are definately in your user folders. Also, you may want to copy the files from C:\users\Sara\Desktop to C:\users\Steve\Desktop to make sure that ALL desktop icons are present.


Next, you would want to enable the Built-in Administrator Account and reboot your machine. Log into the admin account (there should be no password) and try deleting the Sara folder from C:\users\ and see if it works.

You can then disable the admin account (using the above tutorial), reboot then log on as yourself.

Hope it helps.


OS

once i get home tonight i'll try this. thanks

p.s. but my other point was that my \Steve admin user folder is not in the \users folder. However, if I create a non admin account (Steve2 or anything) it does appear in the\users folder

I'll be at work tonight but if you have any more issues I'm sure someone will be able to keep the flame burning

Are you the administrator for the pc.

Hi, yes I am the administrator

Did you delete sara profile in the system.

I see what the problem is here...

It now looks like you've used Control Panel > User Accounts and Family Safety to rename the account name. This, while renaming the user, does not rename the files/folder originally associated with the account.

You'll find all the info you need in the following tutorial

Built-in Administrator Account - Change Name


OS

Sara does not appear in control panel\users, only in the \users folder. It has a padlock, and WILL allow me to delete, but I don't want to delete all my stuff on the desktop so as per previous reply will need to copy my stuff I don't want to lose before deleting Sara from users folder

(thanks OS, saw your further info after replying to previous chap)

Sorry I gave you the wrong link