diff --git a/acceptance/acceptance_test.go b/acceptance/acceptance_test.go
index 8b75ba73bff..957cacac65c 100644
--- a/acceptance/acceptance_test.go
+++ b/acceptance/acceptance_test.go
@@ -963,7 +963,9 @@ func runTest(t *testing.T,
 
 	absDir, err := filepath.Abs(dir)
 	require.NoError(t, err)
-	cmd.Env = append(cmd.Env, "TESTDIR="+absDir)
+	// Use forward slashes so paths built from $TESTDIR (e.g. echoed in trace
+	// output) are stable across OSes and don't need per-test slash replacements.
+	cmd.Env = append(cmd.Env, "TESTDIR="+filepath.ToSlash(absDir))
 	cmd.Env = append(cmd.Env, "CLOUD_ENV="+cloudEnv)
 	cmd.Env = append(cmd.Env, "CURRENT_USER_NAME="+user.UserName)
 	if !isRunningOnCloud {
diff --git a/acceptance/bundle/templates/default-sql-catalog-dash/test.toml b/acceptance/bundle/templates/default-sql-catalog-dash/test.toml
deleted file mode 100644
index de6edc4b506..00000000000
--- a/acceptance/bundle/templates/default-sql-catalog-dash/test.toml
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,5 +0,0 @@
-[[Repls]]
-# On Windows $TESTDIR expands with backslashes; normalize them so the diff.py
-# path in output.txt matches across platforms.
-Old = '\\'
-New = '/'