I have an unusual problem. The W10 Camera app saves to a "Camera Roll" folder in the account folder of a deleted user. The user is no longer listed in User Accounts, but the folder is still there.

I noticed this when I could not find a video I had made with the Windows Camera app. Trying to open it in the app, I was denied permission. I tried a few different ways and finally got it to open. I was able to manually copy these files to my Camera Roll in the expected location, but they won't save there by default.

Long ago I moved all the default Windows folders such as Documents, Pictures, Videos, etc. from the users folder on the C drive to a new partition on Disk 0 named "K" (thanks to a tutorial here) inside a folder called "Ruekberg" (e.g. pictures are in "K:\Ruekberg\Pictures" etc.). Everything worked fine for the last couple of years.

Earlier this year I had to do an in-place upgrade of Windows 10 to solve some performance issues. I couldn't get access to the Upgrade menus from the Startup menu, until I noticed that I was logging in as a local user "druek" instead of my Microsoft Account username. Both were Administrator accounts. Not sure why I had two accounts. Anyway, once I logged in with my MS Account I was able to do the upgrade. So at some point I had those two user accounts. After the upgrade, I had only the MS Account user account.

All other documents save to the right places, but any pictures or videos I take with Windows Camera go to "K:\druek\Pictures\Camera Roll" instead of "K:\Ruekberg\Pictures\Camera Roll".

Properties in "K:\Ruekberg\Pictures\Camera Roll" show the Location tab, as discussed in the tutorial above. Properties in "K:\druek\Pictures\Camera Roll" do not show the Location tab.

When I go to "Settings-Storage-Change where new content is saved" all the choices point to "RUEKFILES (K:). But since both user account folders for "Ruekberg" and "druek" are on drive K, it doesn't distinguish. (See screenshot.)



In the users folder of the C drive there is a folder called "druek" filled with important looking folders of programs and locations I use, but in fact most of them are empty or have nothing in them of value. Only the OneDrive folder has anything in it; curiously enough, the "Camera Roll" folder has a bunch of pictures in it, but these are duplicates of files already in my actual Pictures folder. Maybe I was experimenting a few years ago with OneDrive. I don't use it any more, and am not signed in.

All of my real documents are in K:\Ruekberg. I would just as soon delete the folder C:\User\druek, but I don't want to screw things up.





I can deal with them being saved to a dumb location (it's really dumb Windows Camera won't let me choose whatever darn location I want to save them in), but I'm denied permission to open them until some magic happens behind the scenes, it's frustrating.

Appreciate any help anyone can offer.

Hello @druekberg,

As a workaround, you could create a hard symbolic link using an option in the tutorial below with "K:\druek\Pictures\Camera Roll" as the source, and "K:\Ruekberg\Pictures\Camera Roll\<new folder>" as the link.

Create Soft and Hard Symbolic Links in Windows

druekberg said:

Thanks, Brink, I always appreciate your wisdom. So there's not a safe way to delete the ophaned "druek" account and folder?

It would just keep recreating this "Camera Roll" folder at this incorrect location each time.

The symbolic link is just a workaround to link these two folders for now, but you would need to find and change the source of what is still set to save to this incorrect location by default.

Double check the two registry keys below to make sure the {AB5FB87B-7CE2-4F83-915D-550846C9537B} value in the right pane is showing the correct path.

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders

druekberg said:

Hey Brink,

Thanks for the further detail. There's no {AB5FB87B-7CE2-4F83-915D-550846C9537B} listed at either of those locations. However, most of the locations listed are C:\Users\druek. The only ones that point to K:\Ruekberg are default folders such as Documents, Music, Pictures. Since I didn't initially change the Location of some default folders, such as Downloads, Favorites, those are still pointing to C:\Users\druek.

I wonder if it would fix the issue if I move the Location of Pictures back to the default location at C:\Users\druek, and then back to where I prefer it at K:\Ruekberg.

Otherwise I will do the hard symoblic link thing. It's not a huge issue. I was worried that the druek account was an orphan. It must be the original account I used to set up Windows 10 initially, but now it is hiding in the shadow of my Microsoft Account.

I can post screenshots of those two HKCU\SOFTWARE\ folders you mentioned, if it helps, but I don't want to waste your time.

I would try moving the location of any folder showing the incorrect path to the correct one first.

Restore Default Location of Personal Folders in Windows 10

yw71 said:

Hi

The 'Location' tab is missing in the Camera Roll properties on Windows 11. Is there another location there?

Thanks
YW71

Hello,

Run the shell:Camera Roll command in Run to have it open to the location of the Camera Roll folder, and see if that Camera Roll folder has the Location tab.