Comments on: Howto: Delete undeletable files in Windows XP

By: Tony Terry

Tony Terry — Sun, 29 May 2011 10:17:56 +0000

Thanks for that – I’ve struggled to get rid of a folder that ended with”.” for ages. Your tip and the use of “rd folder /s” sorted it, Thanks a lot.

By: Prashant

Prashant — Sat, 28 May 2011 07:52:37 +0000

That really worked…quick and easy trick..deleted a couple of stubborn files that were just not getting deleted for several days..Thanx..

By: Snark

Snark — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 03:48:02 +0000

Brilliant sir. I’m embarrassed that I didn’t know this trick already! Thank you… I’ve added this trick to my toolbox.

By: wwizard

wwizard — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:46:05 +0000

thanks, worked perfectly on windows 7 with a trailing dot file stuck on my desktop

By: ty

ty — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 15:25:58 +0000

hi, thank you.
Didn’t work instantly,

my annoying file was named 04.avi.
cmd complained about not finding such a file, but with
del *.
it worked llike a charm!

By: Jenny

Jenny — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 02:36:42 +0000

Ahh, I’ve got it. Thank you so much! I feel better. It was annoying the hell out of me. :T

By: K.Mandla

K.Mandla — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 01:56:19 +0000

It’s been a long time since I did this, but I believe if you use the command box to move to your user folder, there should be a Desktop folder inside there. Sorry I can’t be of more help; perhaps another Windows user can chime in and help find that.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 01:46:26 +0000

I got up to step 3.. XD But when I’m in the box, I don’t know how to navigate to the file. Can someone tell me specifically what to type in if my undeletable file is on my desktop? And also what do you type when you delete it? Thank you very much.

By: Sion

Sion — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 07:42:46 +0000

yeah, thats sooo weird! I found a file like this, and I just couldnt delete it either…naturally, I went straight to cygwin to nuke it…but that didnt work…so I thought before I boot knoppix, and smackdown, I will google for wisdom…and you were right, I just went to dos and used DEL ?! this is a hangover from dos 3.1 why this works I can only imagine is a mistake, but it did it…many thanks!

By: pcgeeksince84

pcgeeksince84 — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 06:15:44 +0000

Change to the drive letter via by typing “F:” with out the quotes at the “C:\>documents and Settings\Owner>” or get a Command for dummies book and learn the basic 101s of MS Command . Your lucky you weren’t playing with PCs in the 80s. You would be what they call a ID-10-T error.