NTFS Folder has no owner, no permissions, can't be deleted

Solution 1:

I've seen something similar to this. What ended up being the case is that the file was deleted while there were still outstanding locks on it. I couldn't do a darned thing to it. Clearing the outstanding locks caused the file to fully delete.

Solution 2:

I'd run CHKDSK on the volume before I did anything else. Are you seeing any messages in the System Event Log re: filesystem corruption (source "NTFS")?

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Solution 3:

Had the same issue but no files had a lock on it, it just managed to lose all of it's owners.

Solution was to use TakeOwn

takeown /F dirname

Will take ownership of the file to the current user. Use /A after the dirname to assign it to the system administrator.

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Solution 4:

I ran into a similar problem recently. The cause it my case was that another computer had the file open via a Network file Share. (it was a .dll and the other user had launched a program that opened it).

To close network shared files:

Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management

Then open System Tools -> Shared Folders -> Open Files.

It lists all the files open by another machine.