Getting rid of a huge folder

[KabeRinnaul]

So, long ago I used to run Warez P2P. It's since been uninstalled, but it left behind this large folder of junk files, which I assume to be download trackers. There are currently 372,408 of these things (300 MB in total, 1.42 gig on disk), and they all have a .rsrc file type. I'd want to be rid of them anyway because they're useless and taking up space, but more importantly, it takes AVG hours to scan through that folder.

So here's the thing. I can't actually open this folder or delete it directly. If I try, it processes for a while, then windows locks up. I've been using Search to find "*.rsrc" and deleting them in batches of about 3,000, but "tedious" doesn't even begin to describe this process. So is there a faster way of handling this that won't make my computer throw up its hands in defeat?

[Ironclad Alibi]

Have you tried deleting the folder? Be sure to delete it from the recycle bin afterwards.

Another way to go to the command prompt, which is usually in the Accessories group. This gives you the traditional DOS screen. Go into the folder in question and type "del *.*" or "del *.rsrc" then wait. Do make sure you are in the correct folder. Once the files are gone, delete the folder.

[technical.angel]

You need to try to delete the folder in safe mode. Tap F8 right after you start your computer.

You should be able to delete it then, because nothing using those files should start up.

[KabeRinnaul]

Sorry, been at work.

The first thing I did was trying to delete the folder. It will display the "Deleting..." dialogue box for 5-10 minutes, then freeze. I'll have to use control alt delete to kill the folder, and then after Windows recovers, nothing's been deleted.

And nothing should be using these files, so I doubt that Safe Mode will help. They're just a bunch of text files with hashlinks in them, pointing to downloads on a program I haven't used or had installed in years. I've never gotten a "file or directory in use" warning with this, either, just had it hang up and freeze.

Might try the command line suggestion, however (though mine isn't in Accessories, it's at the top of the start menu - I play with configs too often to have to go find it).

[KabeRinnaul]

...and nevermind. I went to try the command line solution, but couldn't find the folder anymore. Apparently the last time I tried deleting the whole thing, it did manage to send it to Recycle Bin despite freezing. Now I get to see if Recycle Bin can handle deleting it properly...

Edit: Working on it, but predicting 3 hours to deletion. Probably means I should just go to bed...

[dmf]

Yeah 370000 files will take Windows a long time to process and delete. It would delete or open eventually but it has to check each file first.

[lordlundar]

Yeah, I was going to say that odds are it isn't freezing, but it just takes a really long time.

[KabeRinnaul]

Nah, the first few times it really did fully lock up. That's why I gave up doing it all at once. I should point out that I'd been doing this with my Search-and-Delete method for a while. There used to be closer to 600,000 files in there.

Still took almost six hours to fully delete that folder.

[TheSHAD0W]

I had a disk corruption issue that resulted in a problem similar to yours. It reached the point where I had to boot to safe mode command prompt, and then directly edit the disk information to remove the entry for that folder from the parent directory. After that, I had to let chkdsk run and recover all the unlinked clusters.