Deleting windows.old folder on Windows 8

[Yoteen]

I have installed Windows 8 as dual boot with windows 7 in my laptop and I see Windows.old folder in c drive. I want to know how I will have to delete that, I have tried deleting it directly but it is not getting deleted and I am getting an error message. Is there any other method of deleting it as it is occupying unnecessary space in my laptop?

[Suri Paaji]

What exactly is the error message you are getting? Since you have mentioned that your laptop is dual boot try booting in to windows 7 and delete it from there. Even I am having windows 8 as dual boot in my system, I dint try to delete it by booting into windows 8 but I simply booted in windows 7, opened up Windows Explorer, right clicked on windows.old folder and selected delete. I dint had to do anything, it was able to viewed in recycle bin and later I deleted it from there as well.

[Yoteen]

I have tried deleting it by booting it from windows 7 as well as windows 8 but I am getting an error message saying “You do not have the permission to do this. Windows.old folder cannot be deleted”. I have made sure that I am logging in as administrator, don’t know what’s wrong. Further help regarding the same will be highly appreciated.

[Shoana]

You might have not taken ownership of that folder I think, if that’s the case then you can download below attachment. You just have to extract the zip file and drag reg files to your desktop. After dragging it to desktop right click on extracted .reg file and click on Merge. Now you can right click on windows.old folder, click on take ownership and then delete it. If that doesn’t then let me know the exact error you are getting for further help. Make sure that you are logging using administrator and not any other account.

[KJo]

You can take a backup of it somewhere and delete it from your laptop, just follow below steps for deleting it:

1. Open Disk Cleanup, you will get a prompt for selecting drive that you might be willing to clean up and click on ok
2. Now when you get in to “Disk clean up: window then click on “Clean up system files” button, you will again get same prompt so select drive that you might be willing to clean up and click on ok.
3. After that check mark “Previous Windows installations” box in next window and click on ok, click on Delete Files.
4. Disk Cleanup will start and might take some time, so make sure that you are not interrupting its process in between. Once the process gets finished windows.old folder won’t be there in your system anymore.

[Gyan|dada]

You can delete "Windows.old" Folder using Elevated Command Prompt as well, for that you need to follow below steps:

• First open Elevated command prompt, type “RD /S /Q %SystemDrive%\windows.old” without quotes and hit enter.
• Just make sure that you are entering right name of the folder, I mean if you are having something like windows.old.000 then your command should be ““RD /S /Q %SystemDrive%\ windows.old.000”
• Once the process gets completed your windows.old folder will auomatically get deleted.
• I think that this is easiest way of deleting windows.old folder.

[Mr.Ghost]

You can delete "Windows.old" Folder using Command Prompt at Boot as well, incase if above mentioned solutions don’t work out for you.

1. Open Disk Management, make a note of your Windows 7 drive size, insert your Windows 7 installation DVD or system repair disc and boot to command prompt at boot.
2. For verifying Windows 7 Drive Letter at Boot, type “diskpart” without quote and hit enter, after that type “list volume” and hit enter again.
3. Now from the listed volumes verify drive letter and size of your Windows 7 drive which you have noted down in starting and close command prompt by typing “exit” and hitting enter.
4. For deleting "Windows.old" Folder type RD /S /Q "D:\Windows.old" (Make sure that you are replacing letter D with actual drive letter in your case)
5. Once the process gets completed close command prompt and reboot your system and check out if Windowsold folder has got delete or not.