I am running a week old installation of Windows 7 Ultimate on my laptop. On my desktop is a file named "12-545-C-Standard Room.dwg" that I simply cannot delete no matter what I try. The file is 400k. I am logged in to the machine with admin privileges. It is a stand-alone machine used at home. The file was originally sent to me by a trustworthy colleague in a zip file. I've had no problem deleting the zip file. I have antivirus software installed on the machine. I've rebooted the machine several times. I have started Windows minimal Safe Mode. Nothing's worked. Anytime I try to delete the file, I get stuck on the "Preparing to Recycle" dialog on the screen for hours. Attempting to rename the file or moving it results in the same endless dialog. Selecting Properties on the context menu does absolutely nothing. I've also tried deleting the file from the command line and the machine just hung there forever. I'd appreciate any ideas. This is very frustrating. Thanks.

I hope this link helps: http://www.purgeie.com/delinv/index.htm Or, from an answer(? Robinson Zhang) elsewhere here: Hi, Thank you for your update. I suggest you rename this file in CMD. Syntax rename [Drive:][Path] filename1 filename2 ren [Drive:][Path] filename1 filename2For more information about rename command, please click HERE.Does it work?Thanks.

Attempting to rename at the command line just results in the command hanging forever (just like trying to delete from the command line). I don't believe the issue is the name. After all, copying and pasting the file results in a file with a copy of the same name. And that ciopy works just fine. Thanks though.

If I could list all the possible ways to delete it, I'd have letters in my sig,,, I muddle through and eventually succeed. Like, I'd run maybe chkdsk, or if it really bugged me enough, I'd shut down windows, install an NTFS-aware OS, use it to take ownership and delete, or maybe use a state-of-the-art disk manager type program to check for errors, (I had another one but memory is failing fast...oh yeah, use dir /x to find out the short name and use it to delete(or turn off UAC for now, or make sure the file has no attributes, or

Just for grins, have you checked the file's permissions? Read this for more details as you probably just need to take ownership of the file. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727008.aspxMCSE, MCSA, MCDST [If this post helps to resolve your issue, please click the "Mark as Answer" or "Helpful" button at the top of this message. By marking a post as Answered, or Helpful you help others find the answer faster.]

You may try to boot in Win RE. To enter Win RE, please: 1. Restart. 2. Press F8 to enter boot menu.3. Choose “Repair your computer”. You can also boot with your installation DVD to enter Win RE. In Win RE, open Command Prompt. Then try to delete the file with commands. You will use the command “del”.Arthur Xie - MSFT

Thanks for all the suggestions. Unfortunately, attempting to delete using the short name only resulted in a hung process. None of the disk utilities I tried reported any issues with the file or the disk. And if this is a permissions issue, I can think of no way to check since trying to look at the properties of the file results in, you guessed it, a stuck process. But booting into Win RE, opening a command window and deleting the file from there worked like a charm. Thanks Arthur.

Just wanted to chime in on this topic. We experienced this same problem and we were able to resolve it using the Windows RE method. What's interesting is that we had trouble with an Autodesk Revit file and the original poster had trouble with an AutoCAD file so i'm wondering if this could potentially be an issue with Autodesk software running on Windows 7. Either way this solution helped us out, so thanks much.

I come across this problem today , but i got another way to solve this problem , hope this can help my windows get Hung and stuck at preparing whenever i try to delete or rename the file ( a movie ) i solve it by open a program called WINRAR and right click on that file inside WINRAR and choose delete Tada! problem solve

I had the same problem and managed to delete it by first selecting 'properties' and then click on 'unblock'. After that I could remove it.