reinstalling Windows, NTFS file permission?

Question

Hi. As I know, the NTFS file system uses the SID of users to identify users and control their access to files. If I want to reinstall my Windows, all the users would be given new SIDs. Will they then lose their permissions / owner rights to their files (on NTFS volume)? If so, what can I do to preserve the NTFS permissions to users while reinstalling Windows?

I'm afraid reinstalling / upgrading Windows would cause users to lose their rights on the files...

And one more question, since I'm kinda confused about NTFS permissions. If I have an USB drive formatted with NTFS and create a file on a computer (so I have the owner rights), can I still edit the file on another computer? Or do I have read-only rights?

Thanks...

Answer 1

Hi Peter,

You have a number of options. First one would be to give the 'everyone' group full permissions on everything on all your NTFS folders - and then modify them when your windows has been reinstalled. Or you can not change anything and simply 'take ownership' of the files when you are in your new windows install - there is a knowledgebase article on that here http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308421. If you do that with the USB drive, it's advisable to give everyone read and write access otherwise yes, if it's permissions are only for your local account on a local computer you will have problems accessing it. I wouldn't bother formatting it with NTFS unless you need it - format it with FAT32 and all NTFS permissions are lost when you copy everything across.

Answer 2

If you reinstall the operating system, you will lose all your data. If you do an upgrade, you can transfer your files and settings to the new system. The upgrade with a transfer will allow you to keep everything in your system exactly the way it is, so you won't lose your ntfs permissions. However, if you back up your data; the reinstall the operating system, then reload the data from the backup, that should also keep your file permissions. If you have a file on a usb drive (I'm assuming a flash or thumb drive) Its probably configured with Everyone Full Permissions, so you would have the ability to modify it on another pc. There is, on some drives, a little switch that allows you to lock the drive so no data can be modified.

Answer 3

After installing windows make yourself as administrator.


then you can take ownership of particular folder and set different permission for different users.


for eg:
choose any folder you want to security right click over it then go properties then
under security tab go to advanced tab right above the apply button from here choose your user name then click change ownership something like that and finally press ok it take sometime to change ownership acc to your pc configuration after
this you can open this folder.


Or you can do change the permission allow to all the users and after that you can continue to your install windows

Answer 4

How to change the owner ship of all files in drive? It s very cumbersome to change the ownership of each and every file separately.

Answer 5

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