Deleting a corrupt file

[Spawn of Yanni]

I'm having trouble deleting a corrupt file in Opera's cache. Opera tries to delete it itself every time it starts up, giving me an annoying little pop up bubble thing telling me it can't be deleted every time I open the program.

So far, I have tried to delete it normally, by browsing to the file; I've tried deleting it in Safe Mode; I've run Chkdsk three times at varying levels of intensity with no luck; used a program called Unlocker to no avail; and tried to delete it using cmd, but got the same error message - "The file is corrupt blah blah".

I cannot move it, rename it, or gently caress it. I'm beginning to think that the only option left - aside from just letting the bubble pop up every freaking time - is to reinstall Opera and lose all my settings (would I?) but I'm hoping that you guys have any ideas.

Also, Vista.

[scythe]

I don't know a whole lot about NTFS, but you could try defragging the disk, then deleting the file.

What I'm guessing is that the file metadata got messed up in such a way that the size is incorrect, which would mean that deleting the file might overwrite other files. You could try to change the filesize in Properties, but I don't know how to find the correct size.

[Fraxtil]

You might want to try deleting it from a Linux LiveCD, but I don't know whether that would work or not. Another thing you could try is using Eraser to delete it.

Also, could we see the exact error given by Windows (not Opera) when you try deleting it?

[Spawn of Yanni]

The filesize claimed by Explorer is 0 bytes, scythe, but I don't know how to use Properties to change filesizes.

I've already tried using Eraser, but all that does is overwrite a file several times so it's unreadable (basically, it corrupts a normal file) and you can't overwrite a corrupt file.

The error in question is error 0x80070570, giving the message "The file or directory is corrupt and unreadable".

[Tanner]

I had something similar once and the resolution I had was to boot to DOS, navigate to the folder and delete the file that way. Worth a shot?

[Fraxtil]

Run chkdsk again, with /x and /f, from a windows recovery disk. If that doesn't solve it, I doubt anything but a reformat will.

[jean-luc]

1) try deleting the folder
2) defragment
3) chkdsk
4) use a recovery tool like R-Studio to 'restore' the file (all this will do is write size parameters to the file table), and you should then be able to delete it normally. This could very well result in deleting other things, though.

[EdoI]

Try this thing. It's awesome.
I think that Unlocker's window opens as soon as the 'Can't delete...' message jumps out, but I found it easiest to right-click the file, press Unlocker and choose option 'Delete'.

Edit: Reinstalling Opera will leave you your bookmarks, widgets etc. But that makes me think that reinstalling would also leave the same problems. Did you try Unlocker, and did it work for you?

[scythe]

The filesize claimed by Explorer is 0 bytes, scythe, but I don't know how to use Properties to change filesizes.

I've already tried using Eraser, but all that does is overwrite a file several times so it's unreadable (basically, it corrupts a normal file) and you can't overwrite a corrupt file.

The error in question is error 0x80070570, giving the message "The file or directory is corrupt and unreadable".

Boot into Safe Mode and try to delete it again.

[Spawn of Yanni]

R-Studio hasn't worked, Unlocker doesn't do it (as mentioned in the OP), and going through Safe Mode didn't help either. I'm yet to try defragmenting or using a recovery disk because those are the big'uns, but it's looking like those are my last options. At present, I'm just living with that annoying little pop-up bubble. GRAAAAGH

[EdoI]

Try deleting it with Revo Uninstaller, it will delete traces of anything it deletes. Before doing this, make a *.txt file where you write every bookmark of yours, so you don't lose it. If this doesn't work, try finding some registry removal software that will delete Opera's registry files (after you delete it with Revo Uninstaller). Also, set RU to advanced mode (I think that's how it's called).

[t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư]

Boot into Linux (or use Cygwin or something), find the file's memory address, and dd some /dev/null onto the bitch.
...then defrag your hard drive and/or sfc scan, because this is a pretty frickin' medieval approach.

[Exüberance]

I really really doubt this will work since replacing files doesn't actually necessarily overwrite that location on disc (and even if they did, the files would be different sizes so it wouldn't work), but you could try creating a blank file of the same name, then copying it to that directory. You'll probably get the same error, but it's worth a shot. It might just tell your OS to go to the new file instead and that should solve your problem. But, yeah that will probably give you an error. *shrug*

I haven't used cygwin much, but if dev/null/ does what I think it does (overwrites everything between 2 locations with NULL ignoring all types of termination characters) that's probably the most likely thing to work. If Tsukatu's suggestion doesn't work, I don't know what will. Possibly throwing the hard disk into a volcano?

[t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư]

Possibly throwing the hard disk into a volcano?

Mm, indeed. The file would, in fact, be gone.