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Possible Duplicate:
Files with illegal filenames

Under Win7, since 2 weeks, somehow a new folder with three dots D:\...\ was created, but i can't access it, delete it, not even rename it, it tells me that some application is using it.

I installed a Unlocker 1.9 app, no luck, instead it removes ownership from all folder on my disk drive D:, instead of removing a folder with 3 dots, beach. Now i should restore it one by one. Disk D: is on Raid 0, (2x1TB WD Caviar Black).

Now, after using unlocker, i can access (but not delete) that folder, which inside is the same content as in root of disk D:

here is a pic:

enter image description here

thanks for any advice

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aspirinemaga
  • 261

1 Answers1

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You just created an invalid path or your path was somehow corrupted. The problem with the folder is that it's not able to have dots at the end of it.

In this case, we have to tell to Windows to ignore some special reserved names and remove that folder away. Sadly, we can't see the contents folder by a Microsoft Windows product, you'd have to boot on a Linux live CD or something like that to do it.

Happily, we can remove all the contents of the folder and so delete it without exit of the confort of our old friendly system :) Just open the prompt and write the commands:

rmdir /Q /S \\?\c:\path-to-invalid-folder\folder-name\

**Change the "c" letter to your drive letter, folder-name to "..." and so forth...*

Hit enter.

PS: BE CAREFUL WITH THIS COMMAND. It will remove all the contents of a folder and so on. So, if you write it wrong, like "\?\c:\", you'll lose your system.

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bruno
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