When trying to delete an undeletable file or folder, you must have surely faced this error message:
Cannot delete. Access is denied. Make sure the disk is not full or write-protected and that the file is not currently in use
This error message usually occurs when you’re trying to remove a file/folder currently in use by your computer or a certain program/services is currently accessing the file. But most often, this error message occurs when you’re trying to delete a file with file attributes modified by a malware (usually hidden, write-protected and stored at 0KB by size). Why do we actually need to trash such files when they’re not bogging anyway on our computer? Simple. We hate seeing them residing on our hard drives.
This article will walk you through on how to permanently delete “Recycler” folder and persistent .BAT files, .EXEs, and other undeletable files in minutes.
Deleting undeletable file/folder using notepad
The simplest way to delete an undeletable file/folder is to create the same file/folder within that directory using only your native notepad. Here’s how:
- Open your Notepad by clicking Start>Run and type Notepad. This should launch a new Notepad document.
- Optionally, you can type anything in your Notepad but leaving it blank will do.
- Click File and Save As. This should open a Save As dialog.
- Locate the directory where your undeletable file/folder is.
- On the ‘File Type’ box, choose All Files.
- Click once on the undeletable file you want to force delete and its filename should appear in ‘File Name’ box (e.g. Autorun.inf).
- Put a double quote (“) at the start and end of the file name. This instructs Notepad to overwrite it. So from Autorun.inf, it should now be ”Autorun.inf”. Then, hit Save.
Notepad should now prompt you to overwrite the existing file, just choose Yes and that’s it! You can now delete an undeletable file/folder as normal.
