Can't delete a folder! HELP

[No Mercy]

I have this old USB portable harddrive thing which my dad tried to back up his windows vista (in 2009).
I cant seem to delete the ProgramData, Program Files and Windows folders.
I also have backed up alot of data on the drive that I dont wish to format.

 

[BluBirD78]

Well, could you tell us a bit more? Do you get error messages or what happens when you try to delete them? It sounds kinda like to me it's permissions or something like that, I would have to do some reading about it but I'm sure there's a way around it.

 

[No Mercy]

when I try delete the:
Program files folder it says: 'You require Permission from TrustedInstaller to make changes to this folder'
ProgramData folder it says: 'You require Permission from Administrators to make changes to this folder'
Windows folder it says: 'You require Permission from TrustedInstaller to make changes to this folder'

BTW Im on a completely different computer to what the files were backed up from.
The pc which did was thrown out

 

[Joe Momma]

go to start, click on computer, then find the drive. Right click the drive, click format. check the box saying "quick format" then click ok. After this your drive will have all files deleted off of it. Enjoy.

 

[WaLLy]

Joe, he says he doesn't wish to format since he has stuff backed up.

No Mercy, how many gigs are on the USB drive? If it isn't many, I suggest the following:

• Make a new folder on your PC/Laptop called USB stuff
• drag whatever you have that's important in your USB drive into the folder you just made
• double check you got everything saved-format your USB drive (it'll erase EVERYTHING)
• drag the contents from the folder you made to the USB drive.

Done!

 

[No Mercy]

Its a 178GB harddrive, I wasnt wanting to format, but if its the only option which works ill do what you said WaLLy.

 

[WaLLy]

Well, even though it's 178GB, the stuff that you backed up and want to keep isn't 178GB. I'm sure your PC/Laptop should have the space to hold your files temporarely.

 

[HBeta]

try to delete the files inside the folders and then delete the empty folder.

or try this: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/how-to-delete-a-system-file-in-windows-vista/

 

[517Houston]

Move YOUR files your keeping to a hard drive temporarily then format it

 

[No Mercy]

Just letting you guys know ive allready formatted my harddrive and did what WaLLy said

---------- Post added at 09:15 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:14 AM ----------

thanks anyways

---------- Post added at 09:15 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:15 AM ----------