What is DLACTRLW.EXE and can I remove it?

Oscar Sodani is a founder of Help2Go and owner of Help2Go Networks, an IT consulting firm in the Washington D.C. area. Oscar holds the CISSP certification as well as industry certifications from Microsoft, Cisco and Novell.

Chances are, you are finding this file in your WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DLA folder. If so, this file is the Sonic Drive Letter Access component (DLA). It is installed by many Sonic CD and DVD burning software applications such as RecordNow and it is not spyware.

What does DLACTRLW.EXE do?

The Drive Letter Access component allows you to drag and drop files directly to the CD-R or DVD-R drive on your computer, just as you would to any other folder. It writes the files onto the CD as you copy them, taking a lot of the complication out of burning CD or DVD discs with Windows.

Is it necessary?

Only if you actively use the feature. If you burn CDs and DVDs in a traditional way, such as starting up the CD-writer application and choosing files from there, then you can safely disable this program from running at startup. If you don't use Sonic's CD or DVD writing software at all, go ahead and remove them from the Add/Remove Programs option in your Windows Control Panel.

If you are curious as to whether you may have spyware hiding on your computer, we suggest that you run through the steps of our Get Rid of Spyware Guide.

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