Revision 1 as of 2010-05-31 15:58:17

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Windows profile management under Vista/Windows 7 is a bit special compared to how it works under WindowsXP/2000. These are some quick notes to avoid some of the common pitfalls.

Profile Cleanup

The main difference between 2000/XP and Vista/7 is that there are additional references to the profiles stored on a machine stored in the registry (HKLM). Under XP/2000 it was possible to just delete profiles from C:\Documents and Settings in order to clear up disk space from cached profiles. Doing this under Vista/7 will result in 'Profile not found' errors on login.

Rather than muck about in the registry, there is an alternate interface for deletion:

  1. Right click on Computer and Select Properties
  2. Select Advanced System Settings
  3. On the advanced tab, click the 'Settings' button under User Profiles
  4. Delete erroneous profiles through the resulting interface (see below)

Please note, that in the instance we get folder redirection working, the chances of actually needing this is slim.