Copying oddity

logicearth · 08 Oct 2009

Deny permissions have priority over Allow permissions. "Everyone" well of course, affects every account and setting a Deny permission on it, does so for everyone regardless of Allow permissions the current user has. Even the SYSTEM account would be denied. You do not become SYSTEM nor do you need to.

Instead of copying everything over, be selective about it. Only copy over things that make sense to keep. For example there is no point in copying Program Files, ProgramData, Windows, etc. In perfect situations all the files you should could about should be in Users.

Night Hawk · 08 Oct 2009

Selective is the key word there! When going to set up a new clean install of Windows you will also be starting off with an entirely new system registry especially when moving up from the RC to the final retail product. Why would you want to copy the RC registry which will be utterly useless? The program folders on the existing RC installation would be useless as well since you will be starting off all over again fresh.

Certain select files found in your account like documents and saved work from applications would be things to manually backup and be able to reuse once the new fresh installs of the same programs are seen again on the retail version. Wallpapers, theme(custom mainly), IE favorites, and other things user controlled along with any unreplacable items like family photos in the My Pictures folder are certainly the things to consider.

For folder program installers will create again copying to save those and not simply things like game saves, docs, etc. would be a waste of valuable space on the external for reasons like that. Apparently you are thinking about the old 9X clan of versions where entire folders were copied by one dos command while the newer versions(Vista and 7) automatically pack up everything from the existing installation into a new Windows.old folder where you can retrieve data and files from it before sending that on it's way.

Even when performing a fresh clean install of 7 on a fresh primary the Windows installer will automatically create the Windows.old folder which you should have seen when installing the RC. Without replacing one version with a newer one you probably looked at is as an odd empty folder and simply deleted it thinking it was only a temp to install folder at the time.

This was first seen with Vista and carried on with 7 as seen with the MS instructions for removal. How to remove the Windows.old folder that is generated when you perform a custom installation of Windows Vista

johnhoh · 09 Oct 2009

The111 said:

I have a personal habit, whenever I am about to re-format my OS drive, I copy every single directory and file off of it, to an external HDD. So that after I have installed the new OS, I can dig back through the old one for any configuration files, etc, that I need to manually recover and stick back where they need to be.

That's a very useful and basic thing to do that has worked on every PC everywhere for 25 years until now, when it doesn't. If microsoft made a car they would weld the hood shut and call it a safety feature so that you cannot screw up the engine, and half of the people on this board would agree.

If you can ever get "copy c:\*.*" to really work, please post a how-to.

zigzag3143 · 09 Oct 2009

The111 said:

logicearth said:

Administrator is not the full powerful user group as you think it is. SYSTEM account is what has root power. System Volume Information contains system sensitive files there is nothing in there you actually need to see or copy. As for Document and Settings folder it is but a junction to the Users folder. Review the permissions assigned to this folder, the "Everyone" account is listed with a single DENY permission. This folder is best discarded along with the rest of the junctions.

Yes you are right, there is a single deny permission for Everyone... but my admin account has identical permissions to the system account (nothing denied), and I cannot access the folder with the admin account. Even the everyone account has "read" permissions to it.

Assuming there is something I could do with a system account but not an admin, how do I become system?

You cant become system. You can take ownership. Im surprised it hasnt been suggested. win 7 has folders that are simply pointers for older applications. One folder like that is the application data. its locked, the newer apps install into the app data folder which isnt locked. are you sure y ou need the locked folders since win 7 deals with these in different manner?

If you still feel you need to here is take ownership shortcut instructions Take Ownership Shortcut

Hope this helps

Ken

Antman · 09 Oct 2009

johnhoh said:

...If microsoft made a car they would weld the hood shut and call it a safety feature so that you cannot screw up the engine...

Rolls-Royce, Bentley..

...If you can ever get "copy c:\*.*" to really work, please post a how-to.

Roadkil.Net

The111 · 09 Oct 2009

johnhoh said:

The111 said:

I have a personal habit, whenever I am about to re-format my OS drive, I copy every single directory and file off of it, to an external HDD. So that after I have installed the new OS, I can dig back through the old one for any configuration files, etc, that I need to manually recover and stick back where they need to be.

That's a very useful and basic thing to do that has worked on every PC everywhere for 25 years until now, when it doesn't. If microsoft made a car they would weld the hood shut and call it a safety feature so that you cannot screw up the engine, and half of the people on this board would agree.

If you can ever get "copy c:\*.*" to really work, please post a how-to.

Thank you for apparently being the first to understand my point. To everyone who says I "shouldn't need" anything out of the directories I'm having problems with, you're wrong. C:\Windows, for example. I needed my color profiles out of there. Fortunately I have them backed up elsewhere. But when going through and "manually choosing" what to back up, there is always the risk of forgetting something (as I forgot my color profiles when I formatted last night, but again, luckily I had them elsewhere)... so it is always safer to just copy everything and LATER pick and choose what you need. To not be able to copy data from one disk to another is simply idiotic.

The111 · 09 Oct 2009

zigzag3143 said:

are you sure y ou need the locked folders since win 7 deals with these in different manner?

Maybe I don't need the locked folders, but they ruin the whole copying operation if I don't manually exclude every single one, including ones inside buried subfolders. If I hit CTRL+A and try to copy all, the operation will just "end" as if it grabbed it all, and will have missed all sort of contents, even buried subfolders I won't know I'm missing until I try to find them later. It's incredibly stupid.

Antman · 09 Oct 2009

Roadkil.Net

.

The111 · 09 Oct 2009

Thanks for the link, Antman. I'm not at my 7 PC now, nor do I have an immediate need for the tool anymore, but I will try it out one day, next time I am at this junction.

Night Hawk · 09 Oct 2009

The111 said:

johnhoh said:

The111 said:

I have a personal habit, whenever I am about to re-format my OS drive, I copy every single directory and file off of it, to an external HDD. So that after I have installed the new OS, I can dig back through the old one for any configuration files, etc, that I need to manually recover and stick back where they need to be.

That's a very useful and basic thing to do that has worked on every PC everywhere for 25 years until now, when it doesn't. If microsoft made a car they would weld the hood shut and call it a safety feature so that you cannot screw up the engine, and half of the people on this board would agree.

If you can ever get "copy c:\*.*" to really work, please post a how-to.

Thank you for apparently being the first to understand my point. To everyone who says I "shouldn't need" anything out of the directories I'm having problems with, you're wrong. C:\Windows, for example. I needed my color profiles out of there. Fortunately I have them backed up elsewhere. But when going through and "manually choosing" what to back up, there is always the risk of forgetting something (as I forgot my color profiles when I formatted last night, but again, luckily I had them elsewhere)... so it is always safer to just copy everything and LATER pick and choose what you need. To not be able to copy data from one disk to another is simply idiotic.

With 7 it's simply easy enought to see an entire system image created and later restored once a fresh installation goes on. You can also schedule a backup of everything you actually need without manually trying to copy every folder. There are also drive imaging programs which will simply the process as well.

By color profiles does that refer to custom themes?

When using the Windows Easy Transfer tool to try it out on the entire content of the present host OS drive being 7 and performing a fresh test install of 7 on another drive to run the restoration there every file, folder, and even wallpapers previously set on the host with DisplayFusion used for the dual monitor setup here appeared on the second test drive showing the tool automatically backed up and restored all user accessible files and settings on the test copy there.

Even custom folders were copied intact apart from the ones the Windows installer as well as program installers create. The best possible move however is backing things up as you go along.

You won't want to copy everything and try to restore it later if the system goes down with some virus! That would only reinfect the same on a clean copy of Windows.

I know one person who just lost everything when reinstalling Windows on a prebuild for not backing things up as you go along rather then one large copy attempt at everything. Windows crashed and the drive was reformatted for fresh install. The scheduled backup wasn't verified once done to see if everything was actually backed up.

Save a new file? Save it twice once to a custom folder on a second partition or drive in case of mishap with the first! You can always retrieve the second saved file if needed.