Cannot Delete or Repair Corrupted File on NTFS Volume

ID: Q246026

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server
Microsoft Windows 2000 Datacenter Server
Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional
Microsoft Windows 2000 Server
Microsoft Windows NT Server version 4.0
Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 4.0

SYMPTOMS

When you try to delete a file on an NTFS volume, you may receive the following error message:

Cannot delete file name: The file or directory is corrupt and unreadable.

The System event log in Windows NT 4.0 contains the following message:

Event ID: 41
Source: Diskperf
Description: The file system structure on disk is corrupt and unreadable. Please run the chkdsk utility on the device with label "Volume_name"

The System event log in Windows 2000 contains the following message:

Event ID: 55
Source: NTFS
Description: The file system structure on disk is corrupt and unusable. Please run the chkdsk utility on the volume "Drive_letter:"

If you run Chkdsk against the volume, Chkdsk may or may not make repairs, but afterwards you still cannot delete the corrupted file.

CAUSE

This behavior can occur if the NTFS volumes' Master File Table (MFT) is corrupted. The short and long file name pairs that are stored in the directory index record and the file names that are stored in the associated File Record Segment (FRS) contain case-sensitive characters that do not match.

NTFS supports case-sensitive (POSIX) file names, but Chkdsk does not check file names in case-sensitive mode.

For example, assume that the directory index record has a BADFILe.TXT entry but the FRS has a BADFILE.TXT entry for the file name. NTFS views this as being invalid or corrupted, but Chkdsk compares only the names and ignores the case. It does not make repairs.

RESOLUTION

To resolve this issue, back up the volume that contains the corrupted file(s) and exclude the corrupted file(s) from the backup job. Reformat the volume, and then restore from the backup.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

For additional information, click the article numbers below to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q120716 How to Remove Files with Reserved Names in Windows NT

Q176646 Error Message: The File or Directory Is Corrupt...

Additional query words: corruption

Keywords : kberrmsg kbtool
Version : WINDOWS:2000; winnt:4.0
Platform : WINDOWS winnt
Issue type : kbprb