Stacked directories on CD, or not?

[micky]

I'm really confused.

I'm running WinXP SP3 on this computer but I'm still trying to fix my
WinME laptop (Don't ask me why!) which I plan to put win2000 on also.
The harddrive had failed. Files and folders disappeared 1 by 1 or 4
by 4 from the automatically refreshing PowerDesk** list of them before
my very eyes, as I was watching. I had restored an image copy to a new
HDD, but it doesn't boot.

It gives a message, "NTLDR is missing Press any key to restart", I
presume because I was using XP when I restored the backup to the new
HDD, since there is no NTLDR in WinME. Is that right? and doesn't
that sort of thing cause a lot of confusion and problems, like when
working on XP or Vista while running 7, or vice versa?


So, here is the question:: Why do I have "stacked" identical
directories and files on the CD I wrote? Do I actually have them?

Setting the scene:
I've just cloned winME from the backup harddrive to a new HDD, but my
laptop doesn't work. I use Hirem's BootCD to make the partition
active, but it stiill doesn't work I'm thiniking I need a 98 or ME
bootdisk to SYS the HDD with so I dl one from
http://www.allbootdisks.com , an ISO which only has to be burned to a
CD. (Laptop has no floppy drive). I do that using Imgburn, which
displays messages that it has finished, cycles the tray, verifies the
image, and stops. I don't close Imgburn. To see what files the CD
includes, I go to PowerDesk 6, **a Windows Explorer substitute that
uses the same into with a better display format and more options.
(The free version is fine. Don't pay, the company that bought it has
screwed me over twice.)

In PowerDesk, I try to highlight the CD drive, but I get an hourglass
when I put the cursor in the left side of the screen, where the
directories are listed. A second PowerDesk window is open, I
notice in the task bar, but it's not displaying a list of files.
Instead it's a Copy box, in the upper left corner, and it's copying
the same set of files over and over again. It says that but the
light on the CD burner isn't on at all. So I think maybe it's a
virus, and I click on Cancel.

Then it stops, the copy box closes, and I can now position the cursor
in the other PowerDesk window wherever I want.

The root level of trhe CD has 40 files, totalling 1.38 MB and one
subdirectory called Y__ (My CD burner drive is Y In Y__ there are
also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1 subdirectory called Y__ In
that Y__ there are also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1 subdirectory
called Y__ Etc Continuing down for 21 levels!!!!


Imgburn says the output file was:
Image File Size: 3,022,848 bytes
PowerDesk at the bottom says the CD contains 2.88MB, whiich is roughly
twice the 1.38 MB one directory level needs. It's certainly
nowhere what 21 copies would need, one for each level.

Something caused a Windows Explorer window to open up and it doesn't
count them for me, but it has 39 fles listed as "Currently on the CD"
and at the top a folder called Y__ lalbeled "Files ready to be
written"

The Properties for the CD in Drive Y: say that 0 bytes are used out of
702 MB!!! Under the Recording tab, it says that Drag and Drop is
enebled for this drive. But wouldn't the drive light have to go on
if something were being written?

What's going on here? How can I have 21 levels with the same 39
files if it shows only 2.88MB on the CD, probably equal to 3,022,848
bytes that Imgburn says were copied.


Thanks. Sorry it was so long.



BTW, I booted the laptop with the CD, got a dos prompt of A:, which is
what a floppy would have shown, SYSed the C: drive, and now winME
boots and looks just like it did when I made the backup 3 years ago.

Boring part:
Of couse since then AVG will no longer update definiitions, and some
policy has expired for ZoneAlarm so that it won't load and I can find
links, even on the ZoneAlarm page to download old versions, but so far
none work, Adobe Flah Player took a long time to dl a later version,
while I waited to start Fireforx and at the end it told me it didn't
work and I should update my OS! Firefox is version 2 and so far works
fine. I won't update to version 4,5, or 6 because they all have a
problem that I seem to be the only one who notices, and I don't know
if I can find verion 3. That;s why I hope to install win2000 on
this thing. Another thread toflow in the XP group.

 

[dadiOH]

I'm really confused.

I'm running WinXP SP3 on this computer but I'm still trying to fix my
WinME laptop (Don't ask me why!) which I plan to put win2000 on also.
The harddrive had failed. Files and folders disappeared 1 by 1 or 4
by 4 from the automatically refreshing PowerDesk** list of them before
my very eyes, as I was watching. I had restored an image copy to a new
HDD, but it doesn't boot.

It gives a message, "NTLDR is missing Press any key to restart",

What is "it"? Is it the XP computer? If so, did you restore the image to
the same drive letter from which you took it?
____________

I presume because I was using XP when I restored the backup to the new
HDD, since there is no NTLDR in WinME.

It doesn't matter what OS you have installed on a drive when you restore an
image on it because when you restore an image it destroys (over writes) what
was previously there. The OS isn't doing the restoring.
_______________

Is that right? and doesn't
that sort of thing cause a lot of confusion and problems, like when
working on XP or Vista while running 7, or vice versa?

I have no idea because I'm having difficulty following your problems. Your
post is too long and imprecise for me to follow.

So, here is the question:: Why do I have "stacked" identical
directories and files on the CD I wrote? Do I actually have them?

I have no idea because I'm having difficulty following your problems. Your
post is too long and imprecise for me to follow.

--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

 

[micky]

What is "it"? Is it the XP computer? If so, did you restore the image to
the same drive letter from which you took it?

Sory. No, "it" is the winME laptop, with the restored backup on a new
HD. I meant to say that I had backed it up including hidden, system,
and read-only files, and restored it the same way.

Nonethesless, SYS /? said it restored the io.sys file and
indeed it was not there until after I ran SYS. It's been 3 years and
I don't have a detailed recollection of what I did.

____________


It doesn't matter what OS you have installed on a drive when you restore an
image on it because when you restore an image it destroys (over writes) what
was previously there. The OS isn't doing the restoring.

I'm sure it's supposed to be that way, but what DID generate the
message , "NTLDR is missing Press any key to restart", Why would it
expect to find NTLDR at all? This was an empty drive before I
partitoned it and restored winME to it. And after I SYSed it, with
only one exception that I've found so far, it worked just fine and
like an ME computer works.

_______________


I have no idea because I'm having difficulty following your problems. Your
post is too long and imprecise for me to follow.
Sorry.


I have no idea because I'm having difficulty following your problems. Your
post is too long and imprecise for me to follow.

The part you snipped stands on its own. I only included the first
parrt because people always ask for context, and also because it gave
rise to some questinos too.

Here's a slightly different verion of that second part:

To fix my Win ME computer, I needed a ME bootdisk to SYS the HDD with
so I dl one from http://www.allbootdisks.com. The file is, an .ISO
file which only has to be burned to a CD. I do that using Imgburn,
which displays the uysual messages that it has finished, and verified
the image. Then it stops.

To see what files the CD includes, I go to PowerDesk 6, **a Windows
Explorer substitute. In PowerDesk, I try to highlight the CD drive,
but I get an hourglass when I put the cursor in the left side of the
screen, where the directories are listed. A second PowerDesk
window is open, I notice, but it's not displaying a list of files.
Instead it's a small box displaying the Copy function in the upper
left corner, and it shows that it's copying the same series of files
over and over again. It says that but the light on the CD burner
isn't on at all. So I think maybe it's a virus, and I click on
Cancel.

Then it stops, the Copy Box closes, and I can now position the cursor
in the other PowerDesk window wherever I want.

The root level of trhe CD has 40 files, totalling 1.38 MB and one
subdirectory called Y__ (My CD burner drive is Y

In Y__ there are also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1 subdirectory
called Y__ .

In that Y__ there are also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1
subdirectory called Y__ . Etc Continuing down for 21 levels!!!!

Imgburn says the output file was: Image File Size: 3,022,848 bytes.

PowerDesk says the CD contains 2.88MB, whiich is roughly
twice the 1.38 MB one directory level needs. It's certainly
nowhere what 21 copies of the files would need, one for each level.
Twenty-one copies would be almost 30 Megs.

Something caused a Windows Explorer window to open up an it has 39
fles listed as "Currently on the CD" and at the top a folder called
Y__ lalbeled "Files ready to be written"

The Properties for the CD in Drive Y: say that 0 bytes are used out of
702 MB!!! Under the Recording tab, it says that Drag and Drop is
enebled for this drive. But wouldn't the drive light have to go on
if something were being written?

What's going on here? How can I have 21 levels with the same 39
files if it shows only 2.88MB on the CD, and Imgburn says that only
3,022,848 bytes were copied.


Thanks.

 

[dadiOH]

Sory. No, "it" is the winME laptop, with the restored backup on a new
HD. I meant to say that I had backed it up including hidden, system,
and read-only files, and restored it the same way.

Nonethesless, SYS /? said it restored the io.sys file and
indeed it was not there until after I ran SYS. It's been 3 years and
I don't have a detailed recollection of what I did.


I'm sure it's supposed to be that way, but what DID generate the
message , "NTLDR is missing Press any key to restart",

The boot sector - the MBR - on the boot drive
______________

Why would it
expect to find NTLDR at all? This was an empty drive before I
partitoned it and restored winME to it.

What OS partitioned it?
______________

And after I SYSed it, with
only one exception that I've found so far, it worked just fine and
like an ME computer works.

The part you snipped stands on its own. I only included the first
parrt because people always ask for context, and also because it gave
rise to some questinos too.

Here's a slightly different verion of that second part:

To fix my Win ME computer, I needed a ME bootdisk to SYS the HDD with
so I dl one from http://www.allbootdisks.com. The file is, an .ISO
file which only has to be burned to a CD. I do that using Imgburn,
which displays the uysual messages that it has finished, and verified
the image. Then it stops.

To see what files the CD includes, I go to PowerDesk 6, **a Windows
Explorer substitute. In PowerDesk, I try to highlight the CD drive,
but I get an hourglass when I put the cursor in the left side of the
screen, where the directories are listed. A second PowerDesk
window is open, I notice, but it's not displaying a list of files.
Instead it's a small box displaying the Copy function in the upper
left corner, and it shows that it's copying the same series of files
over and over again. It says that but the light on the CD burner
isn't on at all. So I think maybe it's a virus, and I click on
Cancel.

Then it stops, the Copy Box closes, and I can now position the cursor
in the other PowerDesk window wherever I want.

I'd try the above using WinExplorer.
______________

The root level of trhe CD has 40 files, totalling 1.38 MB and one
subdirectory called Y__ (My CD burner drive is Y

In Y__ there are also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1 subdirectory
called Y__ .

In that Y__ there are also 40 files totalling 1.38 MB and 1
subdirectory called Y__ . Etc Continuing down for 21 levels!!!!

Imgburn says the output file was: Image File Size: 3,022,848 bytes.

PowerDesk says the CD contains 2.88MB, whiich is roughly
twice the 1.38 MB one directory level needs. It's certainly
nowhere what 21 copies of the files would need, one for each level.
Twenty-one copies would be almost 30 Megs.

Something caused a Windows Explorer window to open up an it has 39
fles listed as "Currently on the CD" and at the top a folder called
Y__ lalbeled "Files ready to be written"

The Properties for the CD in Drive Y: say that 0 bytes are used out of
702 MB!!! Under the Recording tab, it says that Drag and Drop is
enebled for this drive. But wouldn't the drive light have to go on
if something were being written?

What's going on here? How can I have 21 levels with the same 39
files if it shows only 2.88MB on the CD, and Imgburn says that only
3,022,848 bytes were copied.

The following is supposition.

In order for a program to make a CD from the ISO it has to read the ISO into
RAM and create a file structure. That file structure is then written to
your CD.

The file structure *could* be in RAM or - more likely - it is written
elsewhere temporarily and those temp files are then written to the CD. If
the Y_ subdirectory on the CD is analogous to your Y: CD drive, it sounds as
if your burning program is using the CD as the repository for the temp
files. Normally, the program should delete temp files after writing them to
the CD; obviously, if the temp files are also on the CD they cannot be
deleted.

ImgBurn is a nice program but it is also pretty complex; i.e., it has many,
many settings and an error in setting one or more could cause a host of
strange results. If I were you, I'd try another program to extract the ISO
into files...something simple...one that lets you easily stash the files
onto your HD in a location of your choosing. I would then use another
burning program to write those files to a CD.


--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

 

[micky]

The boot sector - the MBR - on the boot drive
______________


What OS partitioned it?

Aha.. XP. Thanks!. That accounts for the message. ....At least
if SYS is capable of getting rid of the message. Does SYS also change
the MBR, in addition to copying io.sys** and iirc a second file? For
some reason as I think I said, io.sys was missing. (The backup is on
an external drive which isn't connected right now, so I can't check if
it's on the backup.)

**This was an IBM laptop, so it uses IBM DOS, not MS-DOS.

______________


I'd try the above using WinExplorer.

I couldn't before I cancelled the copy, because I thought some virus
was at work. Afterwards, I thought about it, but I've compared the
two programs quite a few times in various stituations over the last 10
years and never found a difference in results.

But what was intriguing is that the nested Y__ directories remained
listed for Y: drive even after I removed the CD!! Then I put in
anotehr CD, the win2000 install CD, and just now I noticed that IN
ADDITION to the what is in the root directory of that CD, also there
is a Y__ directory, and nested under that 20 more Y__ directories.

And it looks the same with Win Explorer!!!!!!!

In WinExp, whenever I highlight a directory from win2000 Install, it
shows what is in the directory, of course.

But when I hightlight the root directory, ENG_W2K_SP1 (Y, in
addition, on the right it shows "Firles ready to be written to the
CD" Y__ (in addition to the directories and files that ARE on the
CD.)

At the same time, whenever I hightlight any of the Y__
sub-directories, the right side of the screen shows "Firles ready to
be written to the CD" and then the subdirectory Y__ and entreis for
the 39 files that are part of the winME boot disk that I made
yesterday.

Somewhere somehow, those files are waiting to be copied to any CD in
the CD drive. I'll bet because I interrrupted the copy yesterday, by
pressing Cancel. I had this once before, and eventually I found
some reaosnable way to get rid of this list of files waiting to be
copied, but I forget what it is. Now these files it plans to
install are just the layers beyond the 21 layers that it shows are
allready on the Win2000 CD, even though they're not. My CD drive is
haunted!
______________

The following is supposition.

In order for a program to make a CD from the ISO it has to read the ISO into
RAM and create a file structure. That file structure is then written to
your CD.

The file structure *could* be in RAM or - more likely - it is written
elsewhere temporarily and those temp files are then written to the CD. If
the Y_ subdirectory on the CD is analogous to your Y: CD drive, it sounds as
if your burning program is using the CD as the repository for the temp
files. Normally, the program should delete temp files after writing them to
the CD; obviously, if the temp files are also on the CD they cannot be
deleted.

ImgBurn is a nice program but it is also pretty complex; i.e., it has many,
many settings and an error in setting one or more could cause a host of
strange results. If I were you, I'd try another program to extract the ISO
into files...something simple...one that lets you easily stash the files
onto your HD in a location of your choosing. I would then use another
burning program to write those files to a CD.

I'll bear all these thoughts in mind next time I do anything related
to this, burn a CD, burn a CD from an .ISO, put any CD in this Y
drive. I would try the Z drive but it won't open. ( I thought I
replaced the whole Z drive but maybe not. Maybe by t he time I got t
he new drive I'd decided to fix up another box.)

I do have the laptop and I'll start on that within a day or two and
I'll see if those Y__ directories are really on the CD, or if they are
only like ghosts on my Y: drive. I'll also see what accounts for the
3 megs on the CD instead of the 1.5 meg that one copy of the 39 files
would have required.

This whole thing has caused no harm afaik but it reminds me: Long
ago, duiring DOS days, I guess I had "cross-linked flies" or
something. About 5 levels down int he direcxtory structure was an
entry that was somehow like C:?, in that underneath it was everything
that was underneath C:/, and this went on multiple times too. I
didn't know about chkdsk then iirc, at least not much, and I just
decided to delete one small file. I did and that led a couple
seconds later to it deleting things in the root directory. Computers
were slower then, but I think by the time I turned off the computer,
I'd lost 250 files.

Using Norton Undelete, I was able to figure out what the first letter
of about 150 of them were.

I restored the other 100 using a for the first letter, if there were
duplicates, b for the first letter, c, or d. It went no higher than
d.

Using the LIST command from Norton DOS, the same as 4DOS, I was able
to easily look inside and get the names of about 70 of the hundred.
The remaining 30 just sat there witth the wrong name waiting until
something I did needed a file. I found the names of about 5 that way.


Thansk.