Hi- Quick question. I changed the security settings for an external HD because for work I was trying to privatize the confidential information from most users on a shared network. I added a few users as having "full control" and denied the rest of the other users-allowing "read-only" capabilities. Now when I set these settings, I tried to access the external HD and it is blocking me from manipulating it (even under a full control user), even worse, i can't change the security settings back to remove the "deny" options/read-only settings I have for the majority of users. Thanks 1 person needs an answerI do too

did you do this on the local policy, i.e. only one XP workstatoin, or on your domain controller? (is this on a domain, or a workgroup?) Simplist fix is safemode if you did this on only one workstation, login with the admin account and revert the changes Safemode - http://tinyurl.com/26vj9aj

Just try to take owner ship of the external HDD, go to sharing and security -->Permission-->Advance-->Owner-->select the user you want to apply access right's and then check "Replace owner" apply and ok, this must be used for you.

that may not work if the owner is an administrator, or he is the current owner and the local policy is what is stopping him from accessing the drive. Best of luck tho.

Thanks for the quick reponses...I'm still working on the problem, but to answer the questions it was done on a workstation under a user who was not the admin on this computer but is an admin on another computer. Another question I had-is going into safe mode and manipulating the ownership at all a risk for damaging the information on the hard drive? Thanks