Background:
I have an installation of Windows 10 on my C: drive, that up until Friday was working perfectly. Then, suddenly I get blue screens (Registry error) whenever trying to boot. I have tried many things to fix it, but the short of it is no program is able to recognize the disk as containing a Windows installation, so most recovery tools dont work.
Goal:
I loaded another SSD into my computer, with a working copy of Windows 10. I would like to transfer my files from the C: drive installation to a backup disk.
Problem:
The files are write protected and I don't have the ability to view the folders.
When I try to enter a folder like C:\Users\<username> I get an error: "You don't currently have permission to access this folder". I tried using takeown and icacls to gain permission, but they did not work because the media is write protected. When I use diskparts to check the disk attributes here's what I get:
DISKPART> attributes disk
Current Read-only State : Yes
Read-only : No
Boot Disk : No
Pagefile Disk : No
Hibernation File Disk : No
Crashdump Disk : No
Clustered Disk : No
The Current Read-only State : Yes concerns me. From what I've read this normally has to do with a physical switch which my SSD definitely does not have.
Question:
How can I modify the permissions of the files on the C: drive, given that I have access to the admin Microsoft account and that I am personally the owner of the files?
