How do you delete a file if it says that the file is open in another program when it is not?

Question

my computer is Windows Vista Basic and some files appeared out of nowhere and it will not let me delete them. it says that they are open in another program but they are not. i have also searched my computer for all of these files and it returned no results therefore they apparently don't exist? pleasee helppp.
the files are named like:
ntuser.dat{aa266bf8-df02-11dd-a2bd-001060e36914}.TM
they all begin with "ntuser" etc..

Answer 1

Be careful what you delete, but if you are sure it is a virus then download a free program called unlocker. I've used it and it works. When you install it, it goes to the right click on your mouse so you go onto a file name and right click. Then you choose to unlock it and then delete it.

Answer 2

Some other program or utility is pointing to this program and the operating system is stopping you from deleting it to protect this other program from crashing horribly. The problem is that you probably already closed this other program but the OS still think that the other program is still using the file. This is probably due to the file not closing the handler to the file properly when exiting. Any program or utility can cause this problem. I even ad it happened by just looking at pictures. You have two choices. #1 close the program that still has a hold of the file. This assumes you know which program was using it and that is not already close. You can do CTRL ALT DEL once to bring up the task manager and see if a program is listed as NOT RUNNING or forcing a particular program to close. Another solution is that if you know which program had a hold of the file once, you can re open it and then have the program oen a different file. Or open the same file then close it again to see if it releases it. If that doesn't work then is time to reboot your computer. The reason being that the reference to the file being used is in memory but you have no way to clear that reference. Rebooting the system should clear the memory and you will be able to delete the file. All of this assumes windows OS. You have other options in unix type systems.

Answer 3

I would leave the ntuser.dat file as this is important in your operating system. It is being used since the file loaded your main profile, where the userid you're logged on to.



"NTUser.dat is the file containing the Hkey_Current_User hive of the Registry and contains all your user settings, desktop customizations, etc. Consequently Windows will hold the file open all the time you're logged in..."