Windows 7: hidden folders

Hi all. I downloaded and installed Win 7 and had files hidden w/ an app called Magic Folders. It apparently doesn't work right, but I have managed to find the two huge folders at c:\$Windows\~Q\DATA\Users\dad\Documents

I have backed them up again, but would like to delete these original and apparently temporary folders. How do I access them? I have looked everywhere.

thanks in advance.

steve

The easiest way would be to enter your Folder Options (Found in Control Panel or search function), Click the "View Tab", scroll down until you see "Hidden Files and Folders" and enable it by clicking on "Show Hidden Files, Folders, and devices". Then hit Apply or OK.

Hidden Files and Folders - Show or Hide

Although I've never used "Magic Folders" I'm sure the problem should get fixed with that.

still can't find the files, despite viewing all system and hidden files.


c:\$windows~Q\DATA\users etc.

Please explain a bit more I'm a little confused.

Can you see them but not access them or have they disappeared after you backed up the folders?

Thanks for the interest. To update, yes, when I installed Win 7, the files couldn't be found at all. But then I found another magic folders executable, this one in the windows directory. when I run it, I can see the files in the program's left pane. it says they're here:

C:\$WINDOWS~Q\DATA\Users\dad\documents but I can't seem to navigate there. don't know what the dollar sign and tilde mean, etc.

Well truth be told if you can't find them with any normal procedure then I think asking for help from Magic Folders would be best.

If you've Uninstalled the program then try to Reinstall it or Uninstall it and Reinstall it if it's still on the system to fix any bugs.

After that I'm pretty much stumped.

The dollar sign identifies a hidden share. This is only used when accessing a network share, however, and not when using a local machine.

The tilde (~) is shown in dos prompts when an illegal character is used or the length of the directory exceeds the maximum number of characters supported with DOS 8.3 file naming.

You should find what you need in the C:\users\dad\documents directory. I'm away from my Windows 7 computer, so I can't remember if that's exactly where you need to look. It may be referencing the hidden application data directory, c:\programdata. I'm certain someone else will chime in to this discussion and let us know the proper directory.

Thanks for the continued interest. After doing some more snooping around, it appears that what I'm seeing in the Magic Folders pane is a Vista vestiqe (I like that phrase). In other words, when I had Vista, the folkders were hidden by Magic Folders. But the program didn't migrate well at all to Win 7. Now the folders are still on the hard drive, but they seem permanently hidden; or at least I can't access them.

What I don't want to do is restore the machine to Vista and then do the Win 7 upgrade again.

I just want to get the drive space back again.

Try a clean install with the 7 disc. Format and reinstall.

OK, but can you guide me through this a bit? What I have is a two-disc emachine set that I made to restore the machine to original Vista. Then I made a Win 7 boot disk with an ISO file. I'm afraid that if I just reinstall the Win 7 upgrade, the files will still be hidden. Do I have to start with vista, then do the Win 7 upgrade? Can I truly do a clean install of Win 7 with the ISO upgrade disk? I know this is a frequently asked question.