I was recently asked to retrieve all the files and directories off a HDD that went out of service in 2007. After acquiring the necessary adapter hardware, I plugged it in and instructed PKZIP to make an archive of everything. The \Windows directory contains a number of sub-directories with "special" DACLs that serve to prevent nosy people from poking around. Yet the reason given amounts to "access denied." I've tried making me the owner of everything on the HDD. I've tried making me the owner of everything in \Windows. I've tried changing the security attributes which produces "failure to enumerate" errors. Geez. The designers certainly didn't make this easy. In the past I've found some directories and files were restricted by DACLs that required some non-existent user or group to access them. Anybody got a surefire method to ga

Hi F7H2fw,

The main issue is to grant the access permission of the files in the HDD ,right ?
We can use the Icacls command line to check and grant the permission.
Here is a link for reference of the Icacls command line :

Icacls
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc753525.aspx
For your situation ,please pay attention to the /t parameter.

Best regards

And here I was searching for lcacls when it is really Icacls.  The font they chose is misleading.  Let's go with ICACLS /t.  I'm going to try that right now.

Yep. That's the answer. Thanks.