Need help managing files owned by user s-1- ...

[urban1]

I recently upgraded from Win XP sp3 to Win 7 Pro x64, sp1. The ownership of a large number of files was changed to 1 of 4 users names beginning with s-1- and followed by a whole bunch of more numbers.

These files need to be deleted, or at least be available to me, as administrator, to change. The user doesn't show up anywhere (I did find it in the registry) and I don't seem to be able to change the ownership of the files.

Any suggestions of how I can handle this situation?

Bob

 

[Brink]

Hello Bob, and welcome to Seven Forums.

The long s-1- number is the unique ID number of an user. These would normally be from users that have been deleted or not currently connected on the network.

If you are logged into an administrator account, then you should be able to take ownership of and set permissions to "Allow" your account "Full control" of the files/folders. You might see if using the "Take Ownship" context menu item below may be able to help.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1911-take-ownership-shortcut.html
​

If not, then see if using OPTION THREE in the tutorial below may.

Take Ownership of file - Vista Forums
​

Once you have ownership and access, you can safely edit and remove (delete) only the s-1- numbers from permissions if you like.

Hope this helps for now,
Shawn

 

[urban1]

Thanks Brink. Incredibly useful information.

Bob

 

[Brink]

You're most welcome Bob. Were you able to get them sorted?