You don't currently have permission to access this folder. Click Continue to permanently get access to this folder. (SSD temporarily accessed with another machine)

Hi Rupert,

This error might be caused if someone have logged in to the user account and changed the user permissions. For us to better assist you, kindly provide us the following information:

• Are you logged in to the administrator account?
• If so, do you have a password set on your administrator account?
• Do you also have any third party security program or antivirus software installed on the computer?

To isolate the cause of the issue, we suggest that you try booting your computer in Safe Mode with Networking and check if you are able to access the folder. To boot to safe mode, you may follow the steps on this link. We also recommend that you give permission to the folder and check if that helps. Kindly follow these steps to give permission to the folder:

1.  Right-click on the folder which you’re unable to access and select Properties.

2.  Click on ‘Security’ tab and under ‘Group or user names’ click on ‘Edit’.

3.  Click on ‘Add’ and type ‘everyone’.

4.  Click on ‘Check names’ and then click ‘OK’.

5.  Select ‘everyone’ and under ‘Allow' select ‘Full control’ and click on ‘Apply’ and click ‘Ok’.

Let us know how it goes.

Hello Anna, thanks for responding to my request.

You state that 'This error might be caused if someone have logged in to the user account and changed the user permissions.'

I was in possession of the SSD the entire time it was removed from the laptop, so there was no chance of the user account being accessed. In addition, the machine remained disassembled until I rebuilt it and reinserted the drive in question.

Nevertheless, the answer to your questions are below and I have also included screen grabs to illustrate my responses:

•Are you logged in to the administrator account?  Yes

•If so, do you have a password set on your administrator account?  Yes

•Do you also have any third party security program or antivirus software installed on the computer?  Yes, Avast.

I did not try safe mode, but I did enable the built-in administrator account via cmd.exe (Net user administrator /active:yes )

When logged into this account, I did not see the 'You don't currently have permission to access this folder' waning.

I also already tried giving permission to the folder(s) in exactly the way you described, but that did not help.

Several of the problem folders are in the hidden AppData folder, as well as several within  C:\Users\*user name*\...

Screen shot below:-

What other suggestions do you have?

We appreciate the update. If you continue to experience permission issues, we recommend that you download and run the File and Folder troubleshooter. This tool diagnoses and repairs Windows file and folder problems.

Let's also check the integrity of your Windows installation. To do this, we suggest that you use the System File Checker tool (SFC.exe) and the Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM.exe) to check and repair your Windows installation. For the steps on how to use these tools, kindly refer to the following link: System file check (SFC) Scan and Repair System Files & DISM to fix things SFC cannot.

If the issue persists, you may refer to the following link for additional troubleshooting steps that you can try: "Access Denied" or other errors when you access or work with files and folders in Windows.

Keep us updated with the results, and we will be glad to assist you further.

Hello Gino.

Thank you for your thoughts on this problem.

I should've pointed out previously that I ran the File and Folder troubleshooter (winfilefolder.DiagCab) when I first encountered the problem and although it appeared to help at first, as soon as the machine was rebooted, the permission problems returned.

Subsequent use of the troubleshooter made no noticeable difference.

I must also remind you of part of my previous post, in which I explained that I did not experience the permission problems when accessing the same files when logged in using the hidden 'super administrator' account (enabled in the command prompt: Net user administrator /active:yes ).

This would presumably preclude your suggestion that the issue lies with the integrity of the Windows installation?

If you really think I should run the SFC.exe and DISM.exe tools, I will have to do it remotely, as I won't be visiting my parents for several weeks.

Incidentally, the link you provided returns an error: "Access Denied" or other errors when you access or work with files and folders in Windows.
 

NB: THE SUPER ADMINISTRATOR ACCOUNT HAS SINCE BEEN DISABLED, RETURNING FULL ADMINSITRATOR STATUS TO MY FATHER'S ACCOUNT

A further development since my first post:

My father asked me to reinstall Open Office, which I attempted to do remotely via MSRA.

Note: I right-clicked the Open Office .exe file and chose 'run as administrator'

After unpacking the necessary files into a folder on the desktop, the installer ran normally at first, but then threw up an error message, claiming that the file 'openoffice1.cab' was not found. 

You can see from the screen shot below that it was, in fact visible in the directory with the other unpacked installation files.

I assumed that the problem had something to do with the wider user permissions issue and so investigated the properties of the 'openoffice1.cab' file.

Below is what I found:

As you can see, my father's account has full control, but I decided to add another group for 'everyone' and give that full control.

That method did the trick and Open Office installed without any problems, but the issue illustrates a key point about the wider permissions problem:

The .cab file in question was created by the system as part of the installation process, but the system (installer) was unable to access it.

This shows how fundamental the problem is and that really, only a system-wide permissions solution will resolve it.

I want to point out at this stage that the problem occurred by merely plugging the drive (via a USB cradle) into another machine, essentially as an eternal storage device, similarly to a flash drive.

How on earth can that simple action have caused such a major problem and HOW CAN IT BE AVOIDED IF I NEEDED TO DO A SIMILAR THING IN FUTURE?

We appreciate the update, Rupert. This is definitely not the usual behavior of Windows. It looks like it may be caused by NTFS permissions being out of whack. Since you mentioned that this issue does not happen on the hidden Administrator account, a workaround would be creating a new local account (with admin rights) on your computer and then use it as your main account. You can transfer user related files (such as documents, desktop, and photos) from the old account to the new account. You will also need to convert the old account first to a local account before converting the new account to a Microsoft account.

You may also refresh the Windows installation. Refreshing your PC reinstalls Windows and keeps your personal files and settings. However, since you are only troubleshooting the PC remotely. This method may not be possible for now. See: How to refresh, reset, or restore your PC.

If you need further assistance, please do not hesitate to post a reply.

Hello Gino, I read your reply with interest.

What you suggest about NTFS permissions makes some sense to me, as it certainly seems to be created at a higher level in the system than I am able to influence from within the windows environment, which is borne out by the files and folders created by an install process suffering from the same issue.

It seems pretty clear that some major intervention is required to put it right properly and that would be best done in person hands-on, rather remotely, even if it is technically possible. For the moment, I've got the machine working well enough by manually accessing all the folders I can think of that are required (many in the hidden AppData folder) and enabling permissions one at a time where required.

I think the best thing is if I make a special trip home in the next few weeks and do a refresh.

I would appreciate a little more info though, as it's not clear how this happened in the first place.

Could you take a look at my original post and see if you can shed some light?

In years past, I used to regularly remove system drives from desktop computers in order to stick into another one as a slave for mass data transfer or even simply to work on very large data sets (CAD assemblies) on another machine without messing with the integrity of the file structure, date stamps etc.

How on earth did accessing my dad's drive in the way I did, end up causing all this trouble?

I certainly don't want to run into this problem again, so any guidance now will help avoid major pain if I ever need to do something similar again..

Connecting a system drive (drive with an OS installation) to a different computer as a slave drive should be safe and not cause problems. However, it can cause Windows and file system permission issues especially if the other computer is taking ownership of the files or folders. Additionally, UAC protections may also cause this issue (You may try disabling UAC and check if the issue will persist).

For more advanced discussion and troubleshooting regarding this issue, we recommend that you post this concern in the Microsoft TechNet forums. TechNet is a community of IT professionals and advanced users.

Regards.