How to completely delete the windows old folder. Editing the download menu

Hello, dear friends, in today's article we have we'll talk about getting rid of old and unnecessary files that remain after Windows reinstallation. More specifically, we will talk about how to delete the Windows.old folder in Windows 7 (for example) from your computer or laptop.

For those who don’t know, I’ll briefly describe what kind of animal this is. The fact is that if, when installing Windows 7, no matter what other version, you did not format the disk where you installed the system, then absolutely all old files are saved in special folder called Windows.old. Naturally, it is necessary to get rid of it, because free space on the hard drive should be valued, and not littered with all sorts of rubbish. Of course, many will say: “Business! I'll go now, find her, click right click mouse, select “Delete”, confirm my actions and everything is fine!” Nothing of the kind!

This, of course, can work, by the way, if you succeed, then you don’t even have to read further, but this rarely happens. Typically, there is an issue with access rights to perform this action. That's why I decided to tell you how to remove it Windows folder.old.

Now we will look at several ways to delete the Windows.old folder.

Removing via Disk Cleanup

Go to “Start” - “All Programs” - “Accessories” - “System Tools” - “Disk Cleanup”. You can also get here a little faster, namely: press the hot keys “Win” + “R” and enter Cleanmgr, then press Enter.

A dialog message will appear in front of you in which you must select local disk, on which you need to perform disk cleanup. For our procedure, you need to specify the drive on which the Windows.old folder is currently located. Then you need to wait a little while the data is analyzed.

In the next window, in the “Disk Cleanup” tab, click “Clean up” system files" If you are asked again which drive Windows is located on, then click OK again. Check the box " Previous installations Windows" and select additional options, if you need to clean something from your computer. Click “OK” and select “Delete files.”

Live CD and assign deletion rights

Like this standard means Windows we just deleted the Windows.old folder. In principle, we can end the article here, but there is another option for how to remove Windows.old - Live CD. If you solve some issues through a Live CD, you can perform the removal procedure directly from under it. You don’t need to go into any settings; you delete it like regular files.

There is also another way to delete it - assign rights to the Windows.old folder and all the data that is in it. To do this, right-click on the folder and select “Properties”. Next, go to the “Security” tab, click on the “Advanced” button and go to the “Owner” tab, click “Change”. Next, select the desired account, check the “Replace owner of containers and objects” box below, then click “Apply”. To specify permissions, click on the “Permissions” tab, click on the “Change” button. Next, indicate the owner, who was made as the owner of this folder, I talked about this a little higher. Click "Edit" and set permissions for it. After this, click “OK”.

• add permissions inherited from parent objects;
• Replace all inheritable permissions for all descendants with new inheritable permissions from this object.

A couple of clicks left 😉. Click OK, a dialog message will appear, click “Yes”. I didn't do it the latter ways screenshots as I hope the first method will help you in this situation.

And that’s all for today, I hope that you have successfully removed Windows.old and now you can download something really useful to your computer. See you soon!

After reinstalling the distribution without formatting the partition or updating operating system Before the “older” version (for example, from “eight” to “ten”), a memory “sink” appears on drive C - the Windows.old folder. It can occupy 8, 10, or 15 gigabytes. But more worthy uses can be found for this disk space. This article will help you correctly remove this “heavy” object from Windows 7, 8 and 10.

Windows 7/8

Method No. 1

1. Left-click on the “Start” icon in the taskbar.

2. In the menu window, in the search line, start typing “cleaning...”. The results for your search will appear in the list. Click on the “Disk Cleanup” option (at the very top, under the “Programs” heading).

3. To delete the Windows.old folder, in the “Disk Cleanup...” window that opens, select the system partition (drive C) from the drop-down menu. Click "OK".

4. Wait a little while the system evaluates the amount of memory external media, which can be cleaned.

5. Upon completion of the analysis, in a new window, on the “Disk Cleanup” tab, in the “Delete” list following files", check the box next to the item "Previous settings..." (this setting includes neutralization Windows old). Click "OK".

6. B additional request confirm your intention to get rid of Windows.old. Click the "Delete Files" button.

After these steps, the folder with the data of the previous OS will disappear.

Method No. 2

1. Press the key combination “Win” + “E”.

2. Right-click on the “Windows (C):” icon (or “Drive C”).

3. In the list of options context menu select Properties.

4. In the “Properties” window that opens, on the “General” tab, click the “Disk Cleanup” function.

5. Wait until scanning is completed. In the list of system objects to be cleaned, check the box “Previous installations...” (contents of Windows.old). And then to delete them, click “OK”.

Attention! If the “Previous settings...” item is not displayed, click on the “Clean up system files” button. After completing this procedure, it will appear in the list.

Windows 10

Method No. 1

1. Press the “Win” and “R” keys simultaneously.

2. The Run window will appear on the display. In the Open field, enter - cleanmgr ( system utility, which deletes the folder with the old OS files).

3. In the cleaning settings window, click on the “Clean up system…” button.

4. After completing the operation, in the list of elements (in the same window), check the box next to “Previous settings...”.

5. Click OK.

6. In the additional window, confirm the start of cleaning: click “Delete files”.

Method No. 2

This option allows you to quickly get rid of Windows.old by running a special directive on the command line.

1. Right-click on the “Start” icon.

2. In the menu that opens, select “Command Prompt (Administrator).”

3. In the window command line, in the line “C:\Windows\system32\>”, enter:

RD /S /Q C:\Windows.old

4. Press "Enter".

Attention! If the folder is not deleted (a command execution error appears), check whether the directive characters are typed correctly and whether there are spaces between them.

Method No. 3

1. Left-click on the notification panel in the tray.

2. From the tiled menu that appears, select All Options.

3. Go to the “System” section.

4. In the subsection column located on the left side of the window, click “Storage”.

5. In the next panel, click on “This computer (C:)”.

6. The system will analyze the memory used in system partition(wait for it to complete!). Used space will be displayed, sorted by data category (Applications, Documents, Pictures, etc.).

7. Click on the category “ Temporary files».

8. In the “Previous version...” block, click on the “Delete previous versions” button.

That's all the solutions. Choose a method according to the distribution you are using. Let it always be present on the C drive of your PC free space in sufficient quantity.

The windows.old directory stores a variety of data from previous version The OS that was installed on the user's computer. This folder contains system data and user data, which includes documents and programs installed in the previous version of the OS. This directory appears only after installation new version operating system when using an old one graphical environment. This folder is necessary if the computer owner believes that someday the moment will come when he will have to roll back to old version OS. Uninstalling the windows.old folder will not negatively affect performance current version OS, but in case of problems you will have to reinstall the entire system again.

The folder itself has quite large sizes, since it stores the OS and all related system and user files. When deleting using the standard method (selecting a folder and deleting), you may notice that it will not be completely deleted. Therefore, we need to look for a different approach to solving the problem.

How to remove windows old in windows 7

To begin the procedure, open special utility- “disk cleanup”. To do this, open Explorer and right-click on the drive that is the system drive (where the OS version is stored). In the list that appears, select “Properties”.

After launching this system utility, the process of analyzing the amount of space that the program can free up will automatically start. At the bottom there is a “Clean up system files” button.

After clicking, in the window that appears, in the menu we find the item “Previous Windows installations”, select it and press the “Ok” button. A notification window will appear asking you to confirm the procedure.

Upon completion, the Windows.old folder will be completely removed from the personal computer.

How to remove windows old in windows 8

In Windows 8 and 10, the procedure for deleting a folder is slightly different. To do this, press the Win+R key combination on your keyboard. A search window will appear where we enter “cleanmgr”.

The system disk cleanup utility will open. In the menu, select the system drive and press the “Ok” button.

and select “Previous Windows”.

Also, if the list contains the items “Update log files” and “Temporary Windows installation files”, then be sure to check the box there and confirm the procedure. Otherwise, the folder itself may remain, but some of the information in it will be deleted.

How to remove windows old in windows 10

Delete the Windows.old directory in Windows 7,8, 10 using the command line
The procedure for uninstalling Windows.old via the command line is just as simple. In “Start”, in the “System Tools” section, select “Command Prompt” and run it with administrator rights. Otherwise, the commands simply will not be executed. In order to do this, right-click on the icon and select the “Run as administrator” option.

A window will open where you need to enter a command that provides access to the folder - takeown /F C:\Windows.old\* /R /A. If the outcome is positive, a corresponding notification will appear on the command line. Next, we move on to the second stage.

Now enter the command: cacls C:\Windows.old\*.* /T /grant admin:F. admin is your name account. After clicking Enter buttons, a warning will appear in which you must either agree with the action or refuse it. To confirm, press the Y button. in this case a mapping will be made between usernames and security IDs. This procedure may not be completed (a corresponding warning will appear), however, the last thing remains to be done.

The last step is to directly delete the Windows.old folder. To do this, type the command in the window: rmdir /S /Q C:\Windows.old\ and confirm it.

All Windowsl.old folders have been deleted.

When a user upgrades his operating system to Windows 10, a Windows.old folder appears on his hard drive. However, this directory often takes up valuable memory - its volume is not limited to several tens of gigabytes. This raises the question, is it possible to remove Windows.old from system disk and avoid unwanted consequences.

Windows.old: what is this folder

The Windows.old directory appears precisely after an OS upgrade. This can be considered a manifestation of Microsoft's concern for the user: all data on the previous version of the system is stored in the folder, so that you can return to it at any moment. It often happens that the user is not satisfied with the new OS for some reason. In other words, the Windows.old directory is needed to restore the previous system. It is stored in memory for 30 days, after which Win 10 deletes the folder itself, although not always entirely.

The Windows.old folder appears on the system drive after Windows updates and is stored there for a month

In this directory you can find various files from the version of the OS that was on the computer before - they can be of value to the user. Windows.old includes the following sections:

• Windows, which contains system files;
• Documents and Settings, where all documents and settings of the previous OS are stored;
• Program Files with program files, previously installed on this PC.

Is it possible to remove Windows.old in Win 10

If you have worked with the “ten” and realized that the OS is completely satisfactory for you and no rollbacks to the previous version are required, and there are no files or documents of interest left in the directory, then you can safely delete it. In the end, a dozen or two freed up gigabytes never hurt anyone.

How to remove Windows.old in Win 10

If you have already tried to simply remove the Windows.old directory from your PC traditional way, then you were disappointed: when you press the traditional button in such cases Delete keys nothing happens. Sometimes the combination works Shift keys+ Del, but this is rather an exception to the rule. To get rid of this folder there are several quite simple ways, including standard Windows tools.

Video: The two easiest methods to remove Windows.old

Via Disk Cleanup

The Windows.old directory can usually be deleted without problems using standard tool Win 10 Disk Cleanup. To do this you need to take the following steps:

1. Press the Win + R buttons simultaneously and enter the command “cleanmgr” in the line that appears.
2. The Disk Cleanup utility window will appear on the screen. In the lower left side, select "Clean up system files."
3. In the new window, find the “Previous Windows installations” section, check the box and click “OK” to confirm your actions.
4. The system will show a warning that you can delete important system data - in our case we do not pay attention to this. After a short period of time, the Windows.old directory will be completely erased from the PC.

Photo gallery: step-by-step instructions for deleting the Windows.old folder using Disk Cleanup

Click Win keys+ R and type the command “cleanmgr” In the utility window, select “Clean up system files” and click “OK” Check the “Previous Windows installations” checkbox and click “OK” Wait until the system deletes the Windows.old folder

Via command line

You can also erase the Windows.old directory using the command line. To do this you need to perform several steps:

To delete the Windows.old folder, enter “RD /S /Q C:\windows.old” in the command line and press Enter

Through the "Task Scheduler"

This method sometimes works if the previous two did not lead to the desired result. The sequence of actions is as follows:

1. Launch Task Scheduler: In Windows 10, this is easiest to do by searching in the Start menu. It can also be opened through the “Control Panel” (section “System and Security”, then at the bottom in the “Administration” item, select “Task Schedule”). Similar to calling the “Control Panel,” by right-clicking the mouse, you can select the “Computer Management” line from the drop-down menu. In the section " Utilities» “Task Scheduler” will appear.
2. In the Scheduler library, you need to open the Windows directory in the Microsoft branch and select the Setup subsection.
3. Click SetupCleanupTask. In the default settings, the Windows.old folder will be erased a month from the date of the system upgrade. Change the task execution date, and “Scheduler” will delete Windows.old at the time you need.

Photo gallery: step-by-step instructions for removing Windows.old using Windows Task Scheduler

"Task Scheduler" in Windows 10 can be found in the "Control Panel" in the "System and Security" section ("Administration") In the "Scheduler" library, open the following folders: Microsoft - Windows - Setup In the SetupCleanupTask section, change the execution date of the task to delete the folder Windows.old to the required

Using third party programs

Many people prefer to use “undeletable” directories like Windows.old to erase CCleaner program and its analogues. This the right approach, because the utility is able to quickly cope with such a task. If you don't have CCleaner installed, you should download it. installation file on a PC from the developer’s website and install the program.

To remove Windows.old via CCleaner application in the “Cleaning” section, select the “Other” (“Advanced”) category and check the box next to “ Old installation Windows" ("Old Windows Installation»)

After launching CCleaner, you need to find the “Other” tab, go to the “Old Windows Installation” line, tick it and start cleaning. The question of whether to delete “Event Logs” can be answered positively. The program will quickly produce necessary actions and will issue a report with a complete list of files that were deleted. The amount of freed memory will also be indicated.

What to do if the Windows.old directory is not deleted

As a rule, the Windows.old directory is completely erased from the system disk using one of the methods listed above. When using the command line method, ensure that all characters are typed correctly and that there are no extra spaces in the commands.

When the contents of the Windows.old directory are not of interest to you, you can safely delete it. This folder is erased from the PC in several ways if you need a free disk space, - the directory really takes up a significant amount of space. Please note: if any files from the previous Windows versions you need, take appropriate measures to save them, because the system itself will delete Windows.old after a month.

Quite recently, when a new version of the OS and a system update first appeared, many people became interested in the question of how to remove windows old in Windows 10, and today we will talk about all the removal methods archive folder.

Windows.Old – storage of components and files of the “previous” one installed system. This folder is created when installing the system on the same partition where the operating system was previously installed or when updating to a new build. Also, this is a backup copy of the data necessary to return to a previous version of Windows (in case of an upgrade) or restore personal files when reinstalling the system to the same partition.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to restore applications if reinstalled ( using standard methods). Basically, personal data will be stored here (Users folders, respectively Downloads, Documents, Photos, desktop, etc.), application settings (*Outlook pst files, saved games, application configurations), application data (databases) .

The folder is stored from 10 to 28 days, depending on the actions performed.

• 10 days – update of the “tens” to the new build (1511->1607, 1607->1703). This period is necessary for a painless return to the previous version of the system.

As part of the cleanup, these applications may delete or clear the Windows.Old folder, making it difficult or impossible to return to a previous version of the operating system.

• 28 days – this period is provided after an update (7 -> 8; 8.1 -> 10, etc.), as well as in case of reinstallation to the same partition (where the OS was previously installed or there was system folder with files).

If all files have been transferred or the OS update is successful, and this folder just gets in the way and takes up free space on the disk, then to remove it, use the following recommendations:

• Uninstalling via the Options window
• Removing via Disk Cleanup
• Uninstall via Command Line

Uninstalling via the Options window

To clear your disk of an unwanted folder through the Options menu, you should run next steps:

Removing via Disk Cleanup

Also, disk cleanup can help you; to do this, follow these steps:

Uninstall via command line

If the above methods did not help, then we will delete it through the command line window:
Call window Command line by entering cmd in the search or Command line, run the application as Administrator and enter the following commands one by one:

• takeown /F C:\Windows.old\* /R /A
  A lengthy redefinition of rights to the contents of the folder will take place. You will be asked to confirm your actions by pressing the Y key.
• cacls C:\Windows.old\*.* /T /grant Administrators:F
  You will be asked to confirm your actions by pressing the Y key.
• rmdir /S /Q C:\Windows.old\
  Removing the Windows.Old folder

Windows.Old can store both personal data from past Windows installations, and can store a “backup” copy of the operating system, so that it would be possible to return to a working state in case of an update error or unforeseen situations, such as turning off the lights. If you are sure that you will no longer need this folder, then feel free to delete it, according to the instructions that were described in this article.