Deleting Stubborn Files

Occasionally, you try to delete a file in Windows Explorer and the system tells you the file is in use or locked in some way and it won’t let you delete it. The usual message you see will be something like this:

"Error Deleting File or Folder, ... There has been a sharing violation. The source or destination file may be in use."

Of course, you know for sure that the file you are hoping to delete is just some spurious orphan with no link to any active process and you really do want to get rid of it because it is taking up disk space. There is an answer to your file lockdown woes. Actually, there are several answers, but I’ve found two that definitely work.

The first is Unlocker. Install it and right-click the errant file (these days, it’s often the remnants of a torrent download that won’t go away) and choose the Unlocker menu item. You will get a neat dialog box asking you what to do, rename, move, delete. Just make your choice. One word of warning, Unlocker will cause your Firewall to cough as it accesses system functionality and also does some internet look ups to identify the filetype. If you are at all worried about this then you might prefer to try WhoLockMe Explorer Extension v1.04 Beta.

This tool is part of a bigger hard drive data recovery package but essentially does the same job as Unlocker. Same usage, install, right-click a file and choose Who Lock Me? menu item. The program will access the system and ping your firewall if you have full security enabled just the same, but it doesn’t seem to try to access the net.

While writing this post, I also came across Microsoft’s answer - ProcessExplorer. Endorphin also had something to say on this issue pointing users to MoveonBoot and HijackThis as providing solutions based on reboot. If you’re really brave you could boot with Linux an NTFS machine and delete it from within that operating system. Of course, if you are playing with Linux already, then this whole issue is redundant.