Windows Event Viewer holds a lock on my EXE file

I released the lock this way:

1. Start -> Services
2. Locate Windows Event Log
3. Right click -> Restart

I just met same problem. The DLL was locked by svchost.exe process (Windows Audio, DHCP Client, Windows Event Log, TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper, Security Center, Task Scheduler)

Solution: close Event Viewer! :)

There's a less known feature introduced in Vista called Restart Manager that can help you release file locks via a user-mode code. Since you tagged it as C++, based on this article here's a small code sample to do that:

#include <RestartManager.h>
#pragma comment(lib ,"Rstrtmgr.lib")

BOOL ReleaseFileLock(LPCTSTR pFilePath)
{
    BOOL bResult = FALSE;

    DWORD dwSession;
    WCHAR szSessionKey[CCH_RM_SESSION_KEY+1] = { 0 };
    DWORD dwError = RmStartSession(&dwSession, 0, szSessionKey);
    if (dwError == ERROR_SUCCESS) 
    {
        dwError = RmRegisterResources(dwSession, 1, &pFilePath,
            0, NULL, 0, NULL);
        if (dwError == ERROR_SUCCESS) 
        {
            UINT nProcInfoNeeded = 0;
            UINT nProcInfo = 0;
            RM_PROCESS_INFO rgpi[1];
            DWORD dwReason;

            dwError = RmGetList(dwSession, &nProcInfoNeeded,
                &nProcInfo, rgpi, &dwReason);
            if (dwError == ERROR_SUCCESS ||
                dwError == ERROR_MORE_DATA) 
            {
                if(nProcInfoNeeded > 0)
                {
                    //If current process does not have enough privileges to close one of
                    //the "offending" processes, you'll get ERROR_FAIL_NOACTION_REBOOT
                    dwError = RmShutdown(dwSession, RmForceShutdown, NULL);
                    if (dwError == ERROR_SUCCESS)
                    {
                        bResult = TRUE;
                    }
                }
                else
                    bResult = TRUE;
            }
        }
    }

    RmEndSession(dwSession);

    SetLastError(dwError);
    return bResult;
}