Vista - "Could not find this item" again

Hey everybody,
this is the second time I can't delete a 0 kb file off my desktop. Vista tells me that it doesn't exist, but it's there on my desktop.
I've tried several things, restarting, deleting in safe mode, deleting via cmd (as administrator), deleting as another user and lots more.
And unfortunately Unlocker doesn't support Vista 64.

Last time it happened I successfully deleted it in the cmd, but this time it simply won't.

I wanted to try to take ownership, but I don't know how to write space in the file name (when deleting I use "", but it can't do so when taking ownership).

What do I do?

EDIT: I figured out how to write spaces when taking ownership, but that didn't work either - it said that the file doesn't exist.

This just happened with another file now.
It was a file I successfully deleted earlier today, then explorer crashed - and now it's back as a 0 kb file.

Hi.
Can you edit the file at all or debug it or de-compile it?
What extension is associated with it?
If it's a text based ASCII file you could try editing it and adding text to
it via a text editor.
And then hit the delete key, perhaps

DH

"Vman" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:00b0c75bc1e967118055ece3720b8d7c@xxxxxx-gateway.com...

It's a .torrent file (they both are).
I can do nothing to it, it's as if the file doesn't exist, but it's still shown as an icon. 0 kb, can't edit, can't move, can't replace, can't rename... nothing.

Hi Again,
That would drive me nuts.
There is a powerful explorer program call XYplorer that sees past if you
will, security settings,
permissions etc. and let's you right in to the bare bones.
It has many features over the normal MS offering but be careful and do back
ups first.
download from : http://www.xyplorer.com/

I presume you have already stripped all the attributes off the .torrents?
read only etc
DH


"Vman" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:e243485d1c4406717bb6e7e7741aed8e@xxxxxx-gateway.com...

I tried deleting the files (I assumed that was what I was supposed to do) with XYplorer), but it didn't help - same issue.

There are none on, but even if there were - I wouldn't be able to do anything about them. I tried clicking on and off - doesn't work.

Basically whatever I do it tells me that the file doesn't exist.

There doesn't seem to be anyone else jumping in to your rescue yet.
My only other thought is that you have an old registry entry still pointing
to the icon/location.
Do you have any shortcuts pointing to the target file location?
There's a handy program called ccleaner which gets recommended around here
quite often.
Again, backup the registry before any attempts to modify the config.
Download here http://www.ccleaner.com
Also but nothing to do with your issue, there's a handy registry defragger
that speeds up processes available at
http://www.auslogics.com/ should you notice programs slow to start.
Do you fancy going back to a previous restore point as a last resort?
Hope this helps
DH


"Vman" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:c54fce8e4e0efdb0e11db7bde43099aa@xxxxxx-gateway.com...

None. I actually cut the files and pasted them somewhere else, they disappeared after the C&P, and reappeared as the current 0 kb-files after an explorer crash.

Tried cleaning the registry and reset, no help

If that indicates losing data, I'd really prefer not to. There have got to be other choices, I can't believe that nobody has an idea about what this might be.

I've been thinking about looking into the indexing or the registry, but I just don't know where to start.

EDIT: And it does help, any suggestions will get me closer to the answer, so thank you!

Thanks to some more Google-searching and ThePrutser on techguy.org, I followed his instructions and it worked.

* goto "Start", "Run" (if you don't see run press the Windows Key + R)
* Type in "cmd" en press "ok". a command prompt will open.
* Goto the drive where the undeletable folder resides for example D:
* So you will have type in D: <enter>
goto the folder where the problem folder is located, in my case it was located in
D:\_cache\delete\
the folder i could not delete was called "happy tree friends" (d:\_cache\delete\happy tree friend) so i typed:
D:<enter>
cd _cache<enter>
cd delete<enter> (As you can see I don't open the problem folder itself)
* type: dir /x<enter>. A directory listing will appear containing the 8.3 names of the folders and files, in my case it showed: happyt~1
* then type: rd happyt~1<enter> (replace happyt~1 with the folder name you see)
The folder will be deleted.

I used "del" instead of "rd" for single files and it worked! Thanks for the help, ThePrutser and DecHex