Windows Vista Forum / Vista Technical / Networking & Internet / Destination Folder Access Denied / Latest Posts

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

windle74 — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 01:45:44 GMT

my problem is very similar, except i get the destination folder access denied message when i attempt to download a file from the internet, i am administrator and have BOTH sharing and security permissions

please help me out everyone

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

WAW8 — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 07:38:07 GMT

[quote][b]peteyc20 (8/2/2009)[/b][hr]
Why on earth should we have to log in as the "secret administrator" to simply copy some files that are sitting on another computer? (files that are already shared by XP with permissions to "share" and "allow network users to change my files")

Doesn't anyone at MS scratch their head and ask themselves if this makes sense? Why on earth are we required to do things like this?

The other solutions on this topic are equally ridiculous. ie.

-Requiring the files be PUSHED from the XP machine rather than pulled from the Vista machine? Huh? What if the files are on a server in another room? That's silly!

- Requiring we disableUser Access Control (then just what good is UAC in the first place?)

- Requiring we log in a secret administrator? (is every user out there who wants to share files in my office supposed to do this)

I can't believe Vista has been out this long and it still suffers from bugs like this. Simply amazing.[/quote]

Agreed, you shouldn't have to be the "secret admin" -- was just commenting that the person was NOT the Admin they thought they were.

As to your last comment, I'm amazed too at the sheer number of serious problems that still arise with Vista -- which is why I've pretty much stopped using it altogether and have switched over to Windows Seven.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

peteyc20 — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 15:12:42 GMT

[quote][b]WAW8 (8/1/2009)[/b][hr]You're almost certainly NOT running as Admin on the Vista machine -- unless you went to the trouble to unhide the true Admin account and are logging in using that. Look a few posts up for info on where to go to find out how to unhide the real Admin account. It doesn't work the same way as it did on XP.[/quote]

Why on earth should we have to log in as the "secret administrator" to simply copy some files that are sitting on another computer? (files that are already shared by XP with permissions to "share" and "allow network users to change my files")

Doesn't anyone at MS scratch their head and ask themselves if this makes sense? Why on earth are we required to do things like this?

The other solutions on this topic are equally ridiculous. ie.

-Requiring the files be PUSHED from the XP machine rather than pulled from the Vista machine? Huh? What if the files are on a server in another room? That's silly!

- Requiring we disable User Access Control (then just what good is UAC in the first place?)

- Requiring we log in a secret administrator? (is every user out there who wants to share files in my office supposed to do this)

I can't believe Vista has been out this long and it still suffers from bugs like this. Simply amazing.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

peteyc20 — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 14:31:14 GMT

That's either

a) a totally naive answer

b) a true answer to a moronic oversight by microsoft.

Excuse me folks, but isn't copying files over a network a very fundamental task our operating system should come ready to do? I'm also struggling trying to copy files off my old XP machine. Vista will do a few hundred files and then for some apparently random reason refuse to copy other files. I have over 22,000 files I need to copy. So far I've gotten through 350 of them, but there's still 13 that I had to "skip" because of this moronic DFAD error message.

I've waited until now to go to Vista because I've heard horror stories. I figured now that Service Pac 2 is out, MS should have most of the major bugs worked out. I can't believe that this is still unresolved!

I'm trying very hard to be constructive here. But WTF?????????????????????????????????????????

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

WAW8 — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 22:36:29 GMT

You're almost certainly NOT running as Admin on the Vista machine -- unless you went to the trouble to unhide the true Admin account and are logging in using that. Look a few posts up for info on where to go to find out how to unhide the real Admin account. It doesn't work the same way as it did on XP.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

mattinahat — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:06:26 GMT

Hey everyone,
I'm having the same problem but with a little different configuration and I'm pulling my hair out. I've been going in circles for two days and I'm starting to lose my mind.

I have a new Vista Home Premium laptop that can see my home desktop running XP SP3; however, when I try and transfer files from my XP desktop to the Vista Laptop I get the message "destination folder access denied. You need permission to perform this action"
I dont know what to do. I thought I had permission and I thought I was running administrator on both machines... any help is super appreciated!
Thanks!
-Matt

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

jqojajo — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 21:35:17 GMT

What worked for me and I hope works for you is to reboot your computer in safemode then try deleting the folder(s) you wish to delete.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

frankbicknell — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 08:24:38 GMT

YES! That is the solution. Thank You.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

user33 — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:55:28 GMT

Hi,

I had this problem (Destination Folder Access Denied) 3-4 months ago trying to copy files between vista and xp in a workgroup environment, no domain. I was not able to share vistas files without compromising the security...

Recently I reinstalled the machines and after applying the latest patches from ms it worked fine.

machine 1:
vista home->service pack1->+patches:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms08-dec.mspx
+Affected Software and Download Locations
+Windows Operating System and Components
+Windows Vista

machine 2:
xp pro sp3 +patches
+Windows XP

shared a folder on vista and when accessed from xp it ask for user and password. I provided the local vista user - it is different from xp. Everything is working now. I can copy and paste files freely.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

WAW8 — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 11:34:52 GMT

Go into our General Technical forum, where you'll find a pinned post about how to do that.

Since you mentioned Boot Camp, I'm presuming you're trying to do this on a Mac? If that's the case, all bets are off as any infrastructure abnormalities are likely to be the victim of emulation glitches. You may be lucky in that someone else here may be able to replicate and debug your problems, but this community is largely native Windows users, with a few Linux users as well.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

shperlam — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 10:44:00 GMT

How do I unhide the "real" admin features, then? I am running Vista through BootCamp, and it's not letting me delete some program files I intend to never use (such as Windows Media Player and the MSN crap). I already changed the owner of C drive to my account (is this a bad idea?) and gave myself "full control" permission, and yet it is still giving me the "destination folder access denied" message.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

WAW8 — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 16:19:14 GMT

Unless you unhid the "real" Administrator accounts on the Vista machines, you are NOT logging in as the admin. This is a common misconception carried over from XP where the default user was created as a full-access Administrator. This is NOT the case with Vista -- in which the default user account is a General user, with only some admin rights.

Also, a second misconception is that turning off UAC automatically grants full access permissions to the default user. This is also NOT true.

Finally, also unlike XP, Vista has locked out some of the standard directories against access, so even as the real Administrator, you will still get access denied messages. This is a typical source of confusion and frustration when you're trying to copy files from either Program Files or Documents and Settings on XP to the similar locations on Vista -- Vista simply won't let you do that.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

isd — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 21:20:18 GMT

Final attempt to deal with Vista crap.

I am accessing files located on a different computer trough network. I am logging as administrator on both computers. (I am logging on the source computer as administrator of that computer, a different user than the vista admin.)
I want to copy a folder that contains some files (.nef) and a subfolder containing tiffs.
All files and folders have exactly the same access rights.
I am able to copy the 1st folder and all the nif files, but when it reaches the subfolder it gives me the destination folder access denied.

I can still return this and I kind of had it with endless issues, this is the final drop.
Nothing mentioned so far worked.
Any ideas?

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

scorch — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:23:45 GMT

[quote][b]PowerJunkie (11/22/2007)[/b][hr]I have (HAD) this same problem!! I started by searching Google then a friend recommended "Unlocker" http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/#download

BAM! I was able to right click on the folder and delete it, easy as pie :)[/quote]

Worked for me too. I used to have unlocker a while back. Just thought there could be a fix for this without using another program. oh well.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

guenthpw — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 11:01:04 GMT

Your instructions make sense but they didn't work for me either. Am trying to copy files from an XP system to a Vista Home Premium system within the same workgroup. Always get the message "Destination folder access denied".

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

barnesra — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 08:04:58 GMT

I am not sure why this posting is [SOLVED]. It appears that several folks are continuing to have the same problem. I am no different.

I am one of several technically savvy administrators that have just joined 9 Vista PC's to our network. We are all attempting to copy different files from the network to our local drives. We are successful only if use a jump drive to copy these files. We are all full administrators on our PC's and full admin rights on the folders we are attempting to copy. Some of the files were created by us and we have full rights over these files.

All of the options in this post have been attempted and all have failed. Until we understand the nature and remedy of this problem we will not deploy the 2000+ PC's to the rest of our organization.

XP to XP copy works

XP to jump drive to VISTA works

XP to VISTA does not work

If this post is monitored by a Microsoft Support somebodythatknowssomething, we would like to hear your comments.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

TAC — Sat, 31 May 2008 09:04:44 GMT

What a pain in the ***! I've tried all these options to my music from an old XP computer to my new Vista machine and finally had to move MyMusic to my desktop, share it and then move the files/folders. In the process of trying all the different Vista sharing and security combinations I've changed the color of my Vista Music folder from the blue/green color to yellow. Does anyone know what exactly this means?

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

SimpleMinded — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 20:36:32 GMT

Been there too ... dealing with permissions can be a bugger. Heres the EASY FIX. You are probably trying to copy files from the SOURCE computers MY DOCUMENTS folder or within it. Windows is trying to protect that data. Just copy the folder or files on the SOURCE computer that you want to the C:\ of the SOURCE machine (or a folder you create on the c:\). Once that is done, you should be able to copy it to the VISTA machine without any problems (provided you have shared the c:). Hope that helps.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Hummie — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 07:45:51 GMT

This morning, I tried installing the registry file in Post #8319 and held down the shift key and right clicked and did see the "take ownership" button. But it did not solve my problem.

I cannot find a link for Jason's post which seems to be a similar file.

Are there any other answers to this problem?

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Hummie — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 02:12:27 GMT

I sure wish someone would help me. I'm so frustrated.

Seems I'm having the same problems as others here. I just got Vista for the first time on the laptop and the desktop is XP.

While on the laptop, I can get files from the desktop and copy them to the laptop.

But when I try to take a file on the laptop and put it on the desktop, I get this error message discussed here.

Tried

gaj90027's suggestion...that didn't work.

I need to be able to move files freely from one to the other on the network to be able to work my business! I'm at whit's end! I cannot be configuring each and every file all the time. That's rediculous...although it didn't work.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Jason — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 21:01:46 GMT

As said in a previous post, one quick easy solution to this problem is to take ownership of the file you are trying to transfer. Below is a simple app to do this for you:

Taking ownership of system files or folders in Windows Vista is not a simple task. Whether you use the GUI or the command line, it takes far too many steps.

Thankfully somebody created a registry hack that will give you a menu item for "Take Ownership" that will handle all the steps for you. (If you are the person that originally made this script, let me know and I'll give you credit)

Here's what the new right-click menu will look like after installing this registry hack.

Install

Download and unzip the files contained in the zipfile. Double-click the InstallTakeOwnership.reg file and click through the prompts. No reboot necessary.

Uninstall

Double-click the RemoveTakeOwnership.reg file and click through the prompts. No reboot necessary.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Pgordon — Sun, 30 Dec 2007 05:38:28 GMT

What about this one then....

I ripped a DVD on my Vista Ultimate machine, to a local drive, - no problem.

I cut & pasted the FOLDER from this machine to an XP MCE2005 machine over the network. - The folder & All files therein copy TO the XP machine no problem, however, ONE of the files (& therefore the folder) did NOT delete from the Vista machine (there were 12 files in total, 11 were deleted by the "cut" operation, one was not)

I try to delete that 1 file with explorer - "Destination Folder Access Denied..."

I have long since turned off that poxy UAC crap, I *AM* an administrator on my Vista machine, I've double-checked the NTFS permissions at the root of the volume (I definately have full control from the root, and down to all subfolders)...

How on earth do the "permissions" contrive to make me able to delete 11 out of the 12 files which were all created at the same time by the same application!?!?! - this is CRAZY!!

Lastly, note that I can't even delete the file by NOT sending it to the recycle bin -that being the "destination folder" in this case... - How can I not have permissions to send stuff to the recycle bin!?!?! - I CAN delete other files/folders perfectly freely, - I can even create & delete other files in the same folder as the file giving me this error, I can empty the recycle bin with no problems... this just plain does not make sense...

Forget about differences between XP & Vista permissions, I'm trying to do nothing more than delete a LOCAL file in a folder which my account is the "owner" of, and in which I have "Full control" (I checked the Effective Rights at this specific folder level)...

Paul G.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

PowerJunkie — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 15:59:11 GMT

I have (HAD) this same problem!! I started by searching Google then a friend recommended "Unlocker" http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/#download

BAM! I was able to right click on the folder and delete it, easy as pie :)

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

TechG1rl — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 23:16:23 GMT

Worked like a charm!! Thanks so much for your post gaj90027.

The problem I had to solve was just copying a file from the E drive into a folder on the C drive and was getting that "Destination Folder" permissions problem. Followed your directions and it copied no problems at all.

Cheers

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

gaj90027 — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 22:06:16 GMT

Just signed up to post my solution to the problem since my situation was a little different.

Old pc with xp home just died so I bought a new pc with vista home premium. I pulled the old hard drive from the xp machine dropped it in a hard drive enclosure and hooked it up by usb to the new vista machine. First attempts to copy any files at all to the new machine were all blocked until I read somewhere about taking ownership of the new files/folders. After taking ownership of all the files and folders that I needed to copy to the new machine there were still about 30 random files from random folders that would not copy over no matter how many times I tried. I finally figured out the solution for my problem by hours of trial and error.

Right click the file - choose properties - security tab - advanced - then on the permissions tab choose edit then uncheck the box that says "include inheritable permissions..." - in the dialog box that pops up next click copy - then back on the permissions tab click apply - now recheck the box that says "include inheritable permissions..." and click apply again - your name should now show up in the permissions tab as having full control - click apply again - then ok, ok, ok - you should now be able to copy those stubborn files.

My stubborn files included 1 avi file in a folder of 9 avi's, 2 mp3's in a folder of 10 mp3's, 5 pdf's in a folder of dozens of pdf's, several zip files and a bunch of random jpg files.

Hope this helps.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

TrevorD — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 20:23:56 GMT

Ok,

I signed up just to post the solution for everybody. I was in the same boat yesterday but searching everywhere, reading about all the security and rights vista needs, I figured out that vista does not have simple file sharing and is not compatible with it on xp either. Soooo, I disabled simple file sharing on my xp pro computer and gave everyone rights to my e drive. I can drag and drop all I want now from anywhere in the e drive to vista. You don't have to make the same users and passwords on the computers, nothing.

I bet this will help alot of people! I looked everywhere to find no solution of the sort.

Peace!

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Jason — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 21:32:50 GMT

Do you get the same result w/ a cut/copy or delete?

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

wekebu — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 12:17:35 GMT

Same problem here: Destination Folder Access Denied. You need permission to perform this action. XP Home on a Desktop, Vista Home Premium on a new laptop. What doesn't make sense to me is, I'm copying .jpg files from the XP to the Vista over my network. Some files will copy, some will not. Some within the same folder will copy, while others will not. All taken on my camera.

I have had no trouble copying over any documents (.doc, .docx, .txt, .xls, .xlsx).

I'm admin on Vista. I don't login on the XP. I'm very, very new to networking.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

MdPc — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 22:06:20 GMT

I had this problem for a week and finally figured it out after reconfiguring firewalls, network settings and trial and error. The cuase of the dreaded error message "Destination Folder Access Denied" was the fact that the files on the XP system (laptop) were MS NTFS encrypted. Evidentally, even though XP will remove the encryption on files that it transfers off the system, Vista can not request a file off the XP system and remove the files encrytion. I haven't searched Microsoft to see if there is a fix for this.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Wildfire2797 — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 09:56:59 GMT

Here is a possible solution to the problems here. One of the most irritating things of Vista is "User Account Control". I have had to disable this on different clients due to the fact that it interferes with basic operations.

Launch Control Panel, User Accounts area, click the "Turn on or off user account control". Disable it, then retry your operation. I have a feeling it may work. You will need to reboot after making the change. You can always put it back when done if you want to. I however, get along just fine without it. Let me know if it works so I can update my KB with this info.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Moyce — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 01:09:04 GMT

If you are running VirusScan 8.5 on the target computer make sure you uncheck the blocking of "prevent creation of remote autorun files" in the Access Control panel in the target computer. That should take care of your problem. VirusScan 8.5 by default blocks other computers from droping autorun.inf files in your system.

Moyce
Alaska, USA

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

ragz — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 02:51:22 GMT

hi,
I have read your query.......... i had the same problem while trying to delete a particular font from the C:\windows\fonts\ folder. i found this great link...
http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=499870
in this link browse down and you will find a link Takeown.zip under the topic "Take Ownership Context Menu Item". Follow these steps....
1)Click on the link TakeOwn.zip
2)It asks for the location to save
3)Save it on the desktop
4)Extract it into a folder for ex: "TakeOwn"
5)you will find a registry file in that folder
6)Click on it
7)Windows will ask you if you want to continue....
8)Click on "YES"
9) Now try to do what you have done before

I am Quite hopeful that this will help.......... bye.....

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

imujval — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 03:21:06 GMT

try same username for both system and make ownership for bothe user.

and also one artical available on this blog you can try that tips also

www.vista-basic.blogspot.com

http://vista-basic.blogspot.com

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

Alan Cobb — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 00:00:22 GMT

Hi All,

Here is the answer (at least it was for me and I expect for most of you also).

First, this is a confusion that happens with XP as well as Vista. Second you don't need to be connected to a network to observe this problem. From Windows Explorer on Vista any shared folders will appear in two places: A) Under "Computer" and B) Under "Network" and the subentry for your machine. You should be able to reproduce the kind of problems described in this thread when you try to access the shared folder under "Network". For example, you may be prevented from creating a new file in the shared folder under "Network", but be able to create the file as expected when you do it in the same folder under "Computer".

So what's causing this? The answer is that there are TWO sets of permissions involved: "NTFS permissions" and "sharing permissions". The folks in this thread are probably getting the "NTFS permissions" set right, but not the "sharing permissions". These are like inner and outer doors on your home. The inner door (NTFS permissions) may be wide open, but until the outer door (sharing permissions) is also open you can't get in.

To get to both groups of settings for Vista, right click on the folder you are trying unsuccessfully to share and select properties. You should see tabs for both "Sharing" and "Security". Select the "Sharing" tab and press the "Advanced Sharing..." button. Press the "Permissions" button. You should see a list of users hopefully including yourself. What sharing permissions do you have? In my case I had "read" permission but not "change" or "full control". Once I checked those boxes I was able to copy files to the shared folder. Note again that these are the sharing permissions (the "outer door"). I had already given myself full permissions on the "Security" tab (these are the NTFS permissions or the "inner door") and even taken ownership on the "Security" tab, but that wasn't enough.

Could the Windows UI be improved to reduce the confusion about these two sets of permissions? Probably, but since the same unclarity was there in XP (and I guess even before) I won't hold my breath :).

Did this fix the problem for any of you?

See also:
http://www.zdnetasia.com/insight/network/0,39044847,39049730-1,00.htm

Alan

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

SmalltimeCTO — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 16:02:08 GMT

I also have the "Destination Folder Access Denied" problem. In my case, it occurs in the process of copying files from a Windows XP Professional system to a Vista system, across a home wired network. It appears to occur specifically in attempts to copy files with certain types, including .pdf. A workaround almost as inconvenient as using a flash memory card to transfer the files is placing them in a .zip archive and transferring that. I don't see how this can't be a Vista bug: if the message really means that the problem is with access to the desination folder, then Windows has no business transferring all the other files into that same folder.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

bj33790 — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 07:56:19 GMT

Hi Labradore, yes this is exactly the problem I have, I have tried everything I can think of to give me permission to copy files to my own folders from across the network, even giving myself full rights of the whole of the C: drive but with no success. I cant believe that no one knows the solution, lots of people must be trying to copy files around a network so it must work! GRRRrrrrrr.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

labradore — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:37:24 GMT

I have almost exactly the same problem. I have an XP "fileserver" at work. It has various shared directories and user accounts. Most shared directories have full control permissions for any authenticated user (i.e. correct username/password).

I log into Vista with my username and the local vista password. Then I browse to the fileserver. To connect I enter the username/password pair. It connects and lets me see the files located on the server. I'm able to create new files, write changes to files, delete files and even read files for opening in many applications (Acrobat Reader and Notepad both read their respective .pdf and .txt files from the share directories on the server). However, if I want to copy files from any share directory on the server over the network to ANY local folder on the vista machine I get the INFURIATING "Destination Folder Access Denied" message. It always waits until the END of the filecopy operation to tell me. Never at the beginning. The first time I found this out was after copying a 1.8GB file from the fileserver to the vista machine.

Yes, I have admin privs on the vista machine. I have even run explorer with elevated privs just to try to make sure.. Nothing works. No file copying FROM the network shares!!!

Ugg. Vista is going to get discarded if I can't find a fix for this crap.

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

bj33790 — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 16:47:01 GMT

Comeon guys and girls, there must be someone bright out there that has solved this problem....please share it with me before I go totally mad...

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

bj33790 — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 17:41:30 GMT

Sorry I forgot to mention, the error says "Destination Folder Access Denied" so it is Vista denying access to my Vista folder for writing to it, not Xp not allowing me to access a file there....surely others are experiencing the same problems?

RE: Destination Folder Access Denied

bj33790 — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 17:31:12 GMT

Hi, Many thank for your reply

I checked the ownership of files on the Xp PC and my rights, and have full ownership and rights of the folder and documents there as well as on the Vista PC.

I tried copying the file from the Xp PC to a USB 'zip key' and then plugged the 'USB Zip key' into the Vista PC and it lets me copy the file from this to any folder I want on the Vista PC. ( I guess thats one way to do it but slow and tedious) ............so it is something to do with copying a file across the network, but surely we all want to that at some time....but it somehow needs more permission...do I have to email Bill Gates for permission to copy my file from the two computers on my network that I own and am the only user and administrator or what?...it doesnt make sense to have such high security that you can't copy files from one PC to another as an administrator.....is this really a security bug in Vista?