Symptoms
Assume that you changed the location of a personal folder in Windows, such as Documents or Downloads, and mapped the folder to another personal folder. When you try to change the location of the folder again, the operation fails. For example: If the personal folder was mapped to a personal folder in the OneDrive folder on the computer, the following error message is received:
Can't move the folder because there is a folder in the same location that can't be redirected. Access is denied.
If the personal folder was mapped to a local personal folder, for example, Documents was mapped to Videos, no error message is displayed. However, after the operation, the two folders' locations are not separated. For more information about how to change the location of a personal folder and map it to another folder, see the "More Information" section.
Workaround
Important: Follow the steps in this section carefully. Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Before you modify it, back up the registry for restoration in case problems occur.
To work around this issue, follow these steps:
-
Right-click the Windows logo at the lower-left corner of the screen, and then click Run.
-
Type regedit.exe and press Enter. If User Account Control window pops up, click Yes.
-
In Registry Editor, browse to the following path: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders
-
Refer to the following table to find the registry key for the folder that encounters this issue, and change it to the default value.
Folder
Registry key
Default value
Downloads
{374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B}
%USERPROFILE%\Downloads
Desktop
Desktop
%USERPROFILE%\Desktop
Favorites
Favorites
%USERPROFILE%\Favorites
Music
My Music
%USERPROFILE%\Music
Pictures
My Pictures
%USERPROFILE%\Pictures
Videos
My Video
%USERPROFILE%\Videos
Documents
Personal
%USERPROFILE%\Documents
-
Restart the Explorer.exe process to make the changes take effect. To do this, you can use either of the following steps:
-
Restart the process in Task Manager.
-
Sign out, and then sign in.
-
Restart the computer.
-
More Information
To change the location of a personal folder, follow these steps:
-
Right-click the personal folder, and then click Properties.
-
Switch to the Location tab in the dialog box.
-
Click Move....
-
Select the destination folder path and then click OK.
