Sometimes in the IT world you just need to let off some steam – sometimes a pile of old PC’s through in the PC ‘Graveyard’ are a fun way to do so.
Often we will play with various ways to kill off old PC’s before they are then securely wiped and recycled, and this command we are about to go into is one of the basics.
del /S /F /Q /A:S C:\windows
Thats it.
Yes it really is that easy to kill a windows PC!
Lets go through it and some of the pitfalls you may find.
del – This is the windows command to delete an object, pretty self explanatory
/S – Deletes specified files from the current directory and all subdirectories. Displays the names of the files as they are being deleted.
/F – Forces deletion of read-only files.
/Q – Specifies quiet mode. You are not prompted for delete confirmation.
/A:S – Deletes files based on the following file attributes, in this case: s = System files
C:\windows – The destination we are deleting.
Why does this work? – Well most people reading this know already, but if you didn’t – the Windows folder simply put is the heart of the Windows operating system. Killing it will stop the OS from booting.
Most users readers will be asking “Why put the C:\Windows” at the end of the script, should it no logically be put in front of the other switches? Well this is to do with personal preference really, and to do with the fact that it is convinient to then go about and delete more contect using the same script, by hitting up arrow, then simply backspacing and changing your destination. Lazy much? You bet you!
Bonus post of to Kill a Windows PC and to make this more effective coming next week – little hint:
takeown /f C:\Windows /r /d y
p.s. This is for information only – be responsible!