Solved Accessing hidden files on external from XP, in Vista 64

Hello,
Recently I upgraded my computer. I have some hidden files on my external from my old system (XP). I cannot, for the life of me get these files to open.

Here is what I have tried:
- Changing ownership (after disabling the easy sharing folder option)
- Working with the admin command prompt (every time it said the folder on my external was a bad or syntactically incorrect entry).
- Changing user permissions.
- Logging in on safe mode and trying the above things.

The files show up as green text, and even after all of these attempts (and copious head-against-wall banging) I cannot open the files. Every program I try to open them with says “You do not have permission to access this file”. A similar message is displayed every time I try to move or change the files.
I have been able to open a few of the files (since the problem began) even though they do not seem to be different file types or status’.

I read a few threads similar to this, but every method has failed, and my problem seems a little different given the XP to Vista nature of the problem and the green text nonsense.

Any help would be much appreciated,

Tyler Wood

Tylerwood said:

The files show up as green text, and even after all of these attempts (and copious head-against-wall banging) I cannot open the files.

Click to expand...

I assume you are not refering to "hidden" files, but encrypted files-(see examples below)

Green text means it is encrypted- You will have to decrypt it with EFS using the original User account it was created with to access file/folder (i.e., Documents) There is no other way to access it.

If you backed up your EFS certificate merely copy it to Vista and "run" it, and you should have access- Though this may cause an issue considering in was encrypted with XP. Best Bet, plug the external back into XP, and log into the same account that created it, go to drive, click the folder/folders in question, click properties, atributes, advanced, and uncheck "encrypt contents to secure data", then click "ok" This will decrypt the files.

Note-If, for whatever reason, you are unable to do this, then the encrypted file/folder contents are not recoverable.

Hello,

Thank you for your helpful post. A couple of questions.

The XP computer in question is no longer living (dead power supply among other issues). The hard drive in question (that i am trying to access files on) is the actual hard drive from that computer, including all windows files.

How do i access the file in question that contains the certification that i am the one who encrypted it? If i have all of the windows files still, it should be contained in there correct?

Thanks

Tyler Wood

You will have to boot into the disk (if possible). Since you have a Different Hardware configuration on the new system, It may only be bootable in safe mode.Try logging into Windows under the User account in question, and unencrypt the documents.

Did you not back up the EFS Recovery Certificate? This may simplify the whole issue just run the backed up certificate on the new system.

Again, If you are unable to run the Recovery Certificate, or boot into the old XP HDD User Account that encrypted the files and decrypt them, you cannot recover the encrypted files.

EDIT:
Here is a tool to recover EFS Encrypted Data.
Advanced EFS Data Recovery 4.1: Download Advanced EFS Data Recovery 4.1