Hi Eric,
When you reinstalled, you created new security ID's, and the old user
profiles have SID's from the old installation. Doing a repair installation
rather than a reinstallation will avoid this issue in the future, please
see:
http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
In the meantime, in order to regain control of the old user files, you will
need to "take ownership" of them. As long as they were not encrypted, this
should allow you access to them once again. If they are encrypted, then you
need an encryption certificate or recovery agent from the original
installation. Without one of these, those files are permanently lost to you.
To take ownership of them, right-click the folder, select properties. Go to
the security tab and click advanced. You can take control of the folders on
the owner tab. For the security tab to appear in a WinXP Pro system, you
must disable simple file sharing in the control panel/folder options/view
tab. For a WinXP Home system, you must restart in safe mode and logon as
administrator. More details here:
HOW TO: Take Ownership of a File or Folder in Windows XP [Q308421]
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421
--
Best of Luck,
Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!
Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
Eric said:
I re-installed win xp pro on my pc with new account name. Previous account
had a password. Now i cannot access the user directory to recover personal
files. Windows replies "access denied" when i try to open the directory with
explorer.
