Solved What happens to files when users are deleted?

[BobPrice]

Help, please!

We bought a Sony laptop running Vista home for my father and set it up for him. Unfortunately he died before he could use it, so I have inherited it. It was distressing seeing his name all over the thing, so I created a new user account in my name, logged in as that and then deleted the old account in his name. A warning did come up saying that he was still logged in and some data may be lost, but as there wasn't much there I went ahead anyway.

All the files under his account had disappeared (including one or two I realised i wanted) as had all his settings and even some software setups. Nothing in the recycle bin; I have run a couple of lost file recovery programs which only find files that have been consciously deleted. Where have his files gone?

 

[Axon]

When you delete an old account, you could choose wheter you delete all data or not and you probably deleted data too.

Sorry to hear about the death of your father.

 

[Brink]

Hi Bob,

You might check to see if by chance the C:\Users\(user name) folder for that account is still there. It does not always get deleted when you delete the account from within User Accounts. If it is still there, the files may still be there as well.

I hope it is for you. I'm sorry to hear about you father.

Shawn

 

[BobPrice]

Hi, Shawn

Thanks for that. Several of the files were there, just like you said. That's why they didn't show up as deleted - like so many things in Windows over the years, its obvious once you know.

Bob

Hi Bob,

You might check to see if by chance the C:\Users\(user name) folder for that account is still there. It does not always get deleted when you delete the account from within User Accounts. If it is still there, the files may still be there as well.

I hope it is for you. I'm sorry to hear about you father.

Shawn

 

[Brink]

Your welcome Bob. I'm happy to hear that they where still there for you.

Shawn