2X disk usage - Why?

[Wade Whitaker]

My computer which runs Windows XP Professional has a 23 Gig partition for
WinXP. I thought this would be adequate for years of use; but after only 6
months I am running out of disk space. The problem is that I can only account
for about 10Gig of files on the drive.

The other day I got a DVD burner and noticed that when I put files in the
"files to burn" window it would add up the size for the files; So, I tried
putting the entire WinXP partition in the this window and it confirmed that It
only had 10Gig. So where is the 10Gig accounting mistake? Hidden system files?

I am using a Soyo Dragon mother board with a 1.8GHz AMD processor that has a
RAID controller on it but the BIOS says it is disabled. And besides there are
two extra IDE connectors on the mother board to do the RAID, which I am not
using. I have never been asked about RAID in any part of the install, So I am
assuming that I don't have some sort of software RAID running.

I am not sure what else to add. Any Ideas?

 

[Simple Guy]

You may have other partitions or other OS.

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Wade

Are you using any Norton utilities? Protected Recycle Bin?

To investigate how you are using hard disk space you need to make sure that
you can see all files. Go to Start, Control Panel, Folder Options, View,
Advanced Settings and verify that the box before "Show hidden files and
folders" is checked and "Hide protected operating system files " is
unchecked. You may need to scroll down to see the second item. You should
also make certain that the box before "Hide extensions for known file types"
is not checked. Next in Windows Explorer make sure View, Details is selected
and then select View, Choose Details and check before Name, Type, Total
Size, and Free Space.

You still will not see the System Volume Information folder.
How to Gain Access to the System Volume Information Folder
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;309531

FileSize -a useful tool for use with Windows Explorer when investigating how
disk space is being used.
http://markd.mvps.org/

The download link is not obvious. Click the here in the two sentences of the
web page accessed through the link above. "I can't count the number of times
someone has asked for this. So here is a module you can install that shows a
Folder Size column in Explorer."


--

Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England

Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Plato]

My computer which runs Windows XP Professional has a 23 Gig partition for
WinXP. I thought this would be adequate for years of use; but after only 6
months I am running out of disk space. The problem is that I can only account
for about 10Gig of files on the drive.

Way too small partition for the average user.

 

[CKL]

| Wade Whitaker wrote:
| >
| > My computer which runs Windows XP Professional has a 23 Gig partition for
| > WinXP. I thought this would be adequate for years of use; but after only 6
| > months I am running out of disk space. The problem is that I can only account
| > for about 10Gig of files on the drive.
|
| Way too small partition for the average user.
|
|
|
| --
| http://www.bootdisk.com/
|
|
Really???
I am planning on installing XPhome on a new drive and was deliberating on how much space to allow for the Windows Partition on an 80g drive (clean install) and I happened on this thread.

I plan on putting "My Documents" on a separate partition (also for my OEstore).
Currently I am using WinME and have set up lots of partitions (to take advantage of the smaller sizes). I have been using this for about 5 years, and my current C (mostly windows and some programs that came with the computer) + D (Programs) + I (IE temp files and a very large OE store) = < 8Gig.
I was thinking that 15G would be plenty.

Can you explain why 23 may be too small for an average user? I really need to get my plan set up.
TIA
CKL

 

[Plato]

Can you explain why 23 may be too small for an average user? I really need to get my plan set up.

No. I dont explain. I dictate facts.

 

[CKL]

| CKL wrote:
| >
| > Can you explain why 23 may be too small for an average user? I really need to get my plan set up.
|
| No. I dont explain. I dictate facts.
|

In other words...... you don't know and have no basis......

 

[Guest]

Gerry et al,

My news reader has not shown any responses, so no reply until now.

I have other partitions and OSs on the disks but , of course, not in this
partition.

I am not using Norton and I don't know about Protected Recycle Bins.
Recycle bins set to 10% and are empty.

I installed the dir size dll you suggested and gained access to tye system
volume folder, as you requested.

I wish I could cut and paste the explorer display; But, the top level
directory of my system disk adds up to 10Gig, 23.2Gig total and 854Meg Free
space. Thats 3426Meg in Doc and Settings, 3184Meg Program Files, 614Meg in
System Volume Information , 2651Meg in Windows, another 1Gig in several
other directories and 1572Meg in the pagefile.sys.

So is it normal at all for Win Xp NTFS partitions to use more space than the
sum of the files? I read about all sorts of stuff on the web like ADS, oh no
I caught ADS!! :') What percent is acceptable?

More background, I have a broadband router and filewall, I used NAV until
it expired and I went for a month before I got connected at work and got it
re-enabled. Virus scan shows a clean system.

I originally put the computer together for work; but my 13 year old took it
over. I ended up adding Spy Doctor to keep the Malware down. So, I may have
something left over from a virus?

ntfs.com talks a lot about backing up all files, deleting everything, and
restoring the backup; But, I can't imagine that WinXP would stand for that.

I thought that waisted cluster space might be the problem but it only added
up to 350Meg. I did a DIR from DOS and got the 10Gig number confirmed.

I ran a defrag analysis which is show below. It shows 22.4Meg used. I says
I should defrag the disk. I tried that but it did not have enough free
space. I'll keep working on getting that done. It's wierd that avg. file
size x number of files comes out to more than size of the disk.

Volume WINXP (S
Volume size = 23.21 GB
Cluster size = 4 KB
Used space = 22.40 GB
Free space = 827 MB
Percent free space = 3 %

Volume fragmentation
Total fragmentation = 31 %
File fragmentation = 54 %
Free space fragmentation = 9 %

File fragmentation
Total files = 141,293
Average file size = 221 KB
Total fragmented files = 6,174
Total excess fragments = 221,429
Average fragments per file = 2.56

Pagefile fragmentation
Pagefile size = 1.50 GB
Total fragments = 7,766

Folder fragmentation
Total folders = 7,297
Fragmented folders = 68
Excess folder fragments = 3,693

Master File Table (MFT) fragmentation
Total MFT size = 272 MB
MFT record count = 149,777
Percent MFT in use = 53 %
Total MFT fragments = 720



Any Ideas?

Regards,

Wade

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

Way too small partition for the average user.

Bullshit.

Which seems to be your specialty.

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

No. I dont explain. I dictate facts.

translation: he's a ****ing moron who can't backup what he posts.

 

[Guest]

Ok, found the problem. There were directories belonging to an unknown user
that had some permissions set that made it invisible. the user name was
something like S-1-5-21-842925246-688789844-1343024091-1004 et. al.

I tried to move some directories out of My Documents so I could defrag the
disk and found some that would not move. Upon changing permissions the
13Gig of data came visible. Now I am trying to remove a directory in the
recycle bin that has the same problem but deleting it puts it back in the
recycle bin.

I am moving all of the data off of this computer. Now the only question is
was the user name used maliciously or as a side effect of some other problem.
A question for another day.

Regards and thanks.