When you upgrade your windows or custom install the windows, windows.old automatically gets created on your computer. This folder contains system files and personal data files of the previous version of windows. If you don’t like the new version of your windows you can go back to your old version using windows.old folder.
You can also restore files from windows.old ones that are not properly transferred to your new version of windows. If all of your files are transferred correctly and you like the newer version of windows, you can also delete the windows.old folder as it can take up a large amount of data on your system.
Manually Windows.old Restore
If you wish to restore your files manually, you can do it by following these steps:
Step 1: Open the File Explorer of your system.
Step 2: Locate your files by going to the following address:
C:\Windows.old\Users\your_name
Step 3: You can select the files and folders that you want to restore. Copy those files.
Step 4: Now, go to the folder where you want to store those files and paste them by right-clicking in the empty space.
Step 5: Keep repeating these steps until all of your files are restored.
You might find some files missing in the restore folder, which means the files transfer didn’t work properly. It happens rarely, but we suggest you back up your files to avoid losing any files.
Automatically Windows.old Restore
Restoring files can be tiresome so it is better to do this task automatically. Microsoft has introduced a troubleshooter which helps you automatically restore your Windows.old files to your desired folder.
Step 1: You can download the troubleshooter from Microsoft’s website.
Step 2: After downloading, launch the wizard. Click next.
Step 3: From here, it is pretty much automated from there. You can see icons appearing on the troubleshooter.
Restore deleted Windows.old folder
Step 1: Go to This PC or This Computer and click on Open.
Step 2: Go to the partition page and find your system partition.
Step 3: Select View on the menu and click to open Options.
Step 4: Click on the Change folder and search options.
Step 5: Go to the View tab and find the Files and Folders option in the Advanced area.
Step 6: Find Hidden files and folders option to check Show hidden files, folders, and drives.
Step 7: Click OK and look for Windows.old folder.
Step 8: Click the old folder and choose properties.
Step 9: Uncheck Hidden under Attributes and click OK. Confirm changes.
Step 10: You can restore the folder from there by copying files.
Recover deleted Windows.old folder
Sometimes you accidentally delete Windows.old folder or due to a software crash, partition loss, or virus attack you might not have windows old folder on your system. How can you get back your data? Don’t panic. It is pretty easy to do; you can use any third-party recovery software but we recommend you to be very careful with that.
You can try EaseUS to recover the lost files from the hard drive in very easy steps.
Step 1: Download EaseUS in your system and run it on your computer. Choose the drive where you lost your files and click on Scan.
Step 2: EaseUs will scan the deleted files when the scan is completed. You can search for your desired files to find them quickly.
Step 3: Click on the Preview button and double-click to get the full preview of files. Select the files you want to recover and click on the Recover option. Copy them and go to the folder you want to paste your files.
Downgrade to the Previous Version
If you don’t like the newer version of your windows you can always downgrade to the previous version using windows.old folder.
Step 1: Go to “Settings > Update & Security > Recovery.
Step 2: Click on the Get Started button under Go back to Windows 7/8.1/10. Click on it.
This will restore your windows from Windows.old folder. This might take some time.
Delete Windows.old folder
If you are sure that you don’t want anything from Windows.old folder, you can delete that folder. Follow these steps to do so:
Step 1. Go to File Explorer on your computer and right-click the system partition (named like C: drive). Then, select Properties.
Step 2. Choose Under the General tab, then select the Disk Cleanup option.
Step 3. Click on Clean up system files.
Step 4. Then, go to the Previous Windows Installation(s) option, check it, and click Ok to apply the changes.
Hope this guide helped you in recovering your files, delete the windows.old folder and downgrade to the previous version of windows. Are you getting Event ID 7023 on Windows? Don’t worry we got some pretty useful solutions for you in our guide.