Question I just installed Windows 10 on my new SSD can I delete Windows 7 and pagefile.sys from my old SSD?

[Gjunki 619]

I just installed Windows 10 on my new SSD but my old SSD has Windows 7 on it. Is it safe to delete the whole Windows folder in the old SSD?
Also is it safe to delete pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys? These are also from my old SSD with the Win 7 on it. Is there any reason I should not touch any of these folders/files?

 

[Barty1884]

If your new SSD with W10 is up and running, and you've backed up/transferred everything you need in terms of files etc - you can outright format the old drive to delete everything.

 

[SkyNetRising]

If you have successfully booted with only new SSD connected, then and only then you can clean, repartition and format the old SSD. Deleting old windows folder will not be that simple.

 

[geofelt]

If you installed windows 10 on the ssd and you had no other drives attached then you can delete whatever you want from the old Windows 7 drive. You might even want to format it.

If, however the windows 7 drive was present during the install, windows will have placed some hidden recovery partitions on the HDD making it impossible to ever boot without the old HDD.

Yes, you could still delete windows folders and such.
Me, if I made that mistake, I would just reinstall windows 10 on the ssd only.

 

[Gjunki 619]

If you installed windows 10 on the ssd and you had no other drives attached then you can delete whatever you want from the old Windows 7 drive. You might even want to format it.

If, however the windows 7 drive was present during the install, windows will have placed some hidden recovery partitions on the HDD making it impossible to ever boot without the old HDD.

Yes, you could still delete windows folders and such.
Me, if I made that mistake, I would just reinstall windows 10 on the ssd only.

I did have the old SSD in the pc rig when I installed the new SSD with Win 10. Does that mean I cant delete the Win 7 folder now due to the recovery partitions? Is there a work around this or will I need to reinstall the entire Win 10 again? Truth be told I'm not sure where my installer disk is.

 

[geofelt]

You can delete the old windows 7 folders.
But, you are now stuck with having the old HDD in your rig since it is necessary to boot.
See what happens if the HDD is not attached when you boot.

I assume that you did a clean install.
Go to Microsoft and download the latest windows 10 image to a USB stick and reinstall using that.

 

[Gjunki 619]

You can delete the old windows 7 folders.
But, you are now stuck with having the old HDD in your rig since it is necessary to boot.
See what happens if the HDD is not attached when you boot.

I assume that you did a clean install.
Go to Microsoft and download the latest windows 10 image to a USB stick and reinstall using that.

If I have to reinstall do I have to be worried about it deleting any files or am I fine? Also can I delete the systemfile and hiberfil.sys?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Try booting with only new SSD connected.
Report, how that goes.

 

[geofelt]

If I have to reinstall do I have to be worried about it deleting any files or am I fine? Also can I delete the systemfile and hiberfil.sys?

If you need to reinstall, just pick the windows install option to do a clean install and clear out the ssd first.

 

[Barty1884]

If, however the windows 7 drive was present during the install, windows will have placed some hidden recovery partitions on the HDD making it impossible to ever boot without the old HDD.

@geofelt, it's not a guarantee that the install would've placed files on the HDD.... It's possible, but it's hardly the norm.
I'd always suggest disconnecting secondary drives to avoid the possibility, but your response would suggest it's going to happen 100% of the time.


Definitely try to boot with only the SSD connected. If all works as intended, you're fine and you can do whatever you want with the HDD.
If you fail to boot with just the SSD connected (and it or the Boot Manager is set to boot priority #1) then you may well have the issue described above.

 

[geofelt]

@Barty1884
What determines whether windows will use the second drive or not?

 

[SkyNetRising]

I'd always suggest disconnecting secondary drives to avoid the possibility, but your response would suggest it's going to happen 100% of the time.

Well - it really is 100% probability.
Windows install checks, if there is bootloader partition already on any of available drives. If bootloader is found, no new bootloader partition will be created. That results in new drive to be unbootable without the old drive.

 

[Gjunki 619]

Try booting with only new SSD connected.
Report, how that goes.

Well - it really is 100% probability.
Windows install checks, if there is bootloader partition already on any of available drives. If bootloader is found, no new bootloader partition will be created. That results in new drive to be unbootable without the old drive.

I rebooted with the old SSD disconnected (the one with Win 7 folder in it) and my computer is running just fine (New SSD with Win 10). Does that mean its safe to delete systemfil and hyberfil and the entire Windows 7 folder on my old SSD?

 

[Barty1884]

@geofelt, I'm not sure.
@SkyNetRising might be the case, just not my experience. I've had an old, unactivated version of W10 on my secondary SSD at various points when clean installing on my primary drive - Personally, I've never run into the issue.

It's anecdotal at best, just my experience. I've seen it happen around here too much to discount it as impossible, but I haven't found any rhyme or reason as it why/when it'll split up a boot partition from the 'main' drive. It happens, absolutely - and I'll always suggest disconnecting any secondary drives for the purposes of an OS install.

 

[Gjunki 619]

@geofelt, I'm not sure.
@SkyNetRising might be the case, just not my experience. I've had an old, unactivated version of W10 on my secondary SSD at various points when clean installing on my primary drive - Personally, I've never run into the issue.

It's anecdotal at best, just my experience. I've seen it happen around here too much to discount it as impossible, but I haven't found any rhyme or reason as it why/when it'll split up a boot partition from the 'main' drive. It happens, absolutely - and I'll always suggest disconnecting any secondary drives for the purposes of an OS install.

I rebooted with the old SSD disconnected (the one with Win 7 folder in it) and my computer is running just fine (New SSD with Win 10). Does that mean its safe to delete systemfil and hyberfil and the entire Windows 7 folder on my old SSD?

 

[Barty1884]

If you can boot with only the new SSD installed then yes, you'd be safe to format the old drive.

 

[Gjunki 619]

If you can boot with only the new SSD installed then yes, you'd be safe to format the old drive.

I just gave myself permission to delete the old Win 7 folder but it says "You need permission from Gjunkis-Rig/Seb to make changes to this folder" I am logged into the only account on this computer which is myself and I used this account to set Windows 10 up on. Where do I go from here?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Told you - deleting old windows folder is not that simple.
Better just format old OS partition.
You can do that from Disk Management.

 

[Barty1884]

I just gave myself permission to delete the old Win 7 folder but it says "You need permission from Gjunkis-Rig/Seb to make changes to this folder" I am logged into the only account on this computer which is myself and I used this account to set Windows 10 up on. Where do I go from here?

As SkyNetRising stated, it's not as simple as "deleting" files. Save any files/data you don't want to lose & then delete old partitions/format the old drive.

 

[Gjunki 619]

Told you - deleting old windows folder is not that simple.
Better just format old OS partition.
You can do that from Disk Management.

As SkyNetRising stated, it's not as simple as "deleting" files. Save any files/data you don't want to lose & then delete old partitions/format the old drive.

Problem is I don't have anywhere I can put my saved files. I dont have a 3rd harddrive to put everything on. Is the only way to delete this to reformat? No other possibility whatsoever?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Is the only way to delete this to reformat? No other possibility whatsoever?

Well there is ...
Execute these commands from elevated command prompt:

takeown /F d:\windows.old /R /D Y​

icacls d:\windows.old /RESET /T /C /L​

(Replace d:\windows.old with location of old windows folder. Do not run this on your current windows folder or you'll have to do full reinstall).
After this you'll be able to delete d:\windows.old folder.