Technology, Windows

Windows 8: Solving the “No Permission to Write Files on Disk” issue

When you upgrade a previous version of Windows to Windows 8 with the format+clean install option, you might have a “nice” surprise of being unable to access the files you previously saved on another partition of your hard drive. By default, Windows OS locks the permissions to the previous owner of the files. What you have to do is change the permissions for the respective files while logged with the Administrator account.

Here is a simple tutorial on how to do this task.

1. Right click the drive or the folder you want the security permissions changed.

2. Click Properties in the panel that shows up.
windows d drive

3. Click the Security tab on the dialog box.

4. Click the Advanced button as shown below

windows sky drive properties

5. Select the user you want to change the permissions in the Advanced Security Settings panel and click Edit. In case no Edit button shows up, click the Disable Inheritance and click Convert Inherited Permissions Into Explicit Permissions On This Object.

advanced security settings for skydrive

6. Give yourself full-control over the folders and files as shown below.

permission entry for skydrive

Now Windows 8 changes the permissions for the files and folders you selected; this process could last longer so don’t turn off your computer or close the dialog box while in progress.

Did this work for you? Please comment if you encountered any difficulty.

2 Comments

  1. Gave me the following error when I changed users and Authenticated users:

    failed to enumerate objects in the container, access is denied.

    But it does seem to have changed the permissions of the selected users.

  2. This is all well and good….IF you have Windows 8 PROFESSIONAL. My machine came with Window 8 HOME and I don’t have the security tab listed above…and you can only get that security tab with PROFESSIONAL. It is very frustrating to have external media (thumb drives & sd cards) and not be able to access my own data! Do you know of any way to get around this in Windows 8 Home?

If you have any questions, please ask below!