hard drive problem

[Guest]

hi ive got a 200 gig hhd and when i go to propites it say its full i the
piechart but when u go in to the hhd and select all folders it says theres
only 40 gig been used . Has any1 got any sugestions on how to fix this prob
ive tryed disk clean but it does not do any thing

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

If you double click My Computer icon from the desktop, it will bring up a Windows Explorer summary view of your system & HDs.
Please make sure you select View, and click on Details. Also, select View, and select Status bar to have it checked.

Does it show Total size of HD and the free space? and also clarify if all the HD is just one partition.

 

[Guest]

yes it does show total size & free space of hd.& its just got 1 partition on
it

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Chunk,
Would you post back, and tell us the numbers for Free space & Total size?

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

Chunk,
Would you post back, and tell us the numbers for Free space & Total size?

This sounds like yet another person with the problem I've had. 80GB hard
disk with about 25GB used. XP Home. SP2. The C: drive pie chart was
telling me I had 59GB in use, however. I disabled system restore and
the pie chart agreed with the sum of all the directories (hidden and
system included) at 25GB. I re-enabled system restore and each time I
re-booted the PC, the pie chart claimed a further 0.5 - 1.0 GB used -
this mounted up as this was added each time I re-booted. It didn't take
long to get back to 50GB in use. My system is set to use no more than
400MB per restore point and in any case, each timeI rebooted and lost
yet more space, there was not an extra restore point there. I have
turned off system restore yet again and kept it off and this problem
does not happen.

It seems to me as if a number of people have been experiencing this
problem recently. Does this imply a) there is a new virus which is
going undetected? (I have used all manner of scanners - AV scanners,
spybot, adaware and ohers and nothing detected), or b) perhaps a recent
windowsupdate has caused this problem?

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Quick note. My systems show the same amount for Free space, both in My
Computer view of Windows Explorer, and the Pie Charts from Explorer's HD
Properties module.
2 suggestions:
Turn on the Status Bar in Windows Explorer. (View > click Status Bar)

And, be sure you enable display of all hidden files.

go into WinExplorer>select Tools>
Folder Options>View>click on Show hidden files and folders and
Uncheck Hide protected operating system files

HTH

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

Quick note. My systems show the same amount for Free space, both in My
Computer view of Windows Explorer, and the Pie Charts from Explorer's HD
Properties module.
2 suggestions:
Turn on the Status Bar in Windows Explorer. (View > click Status Bar)

And, be sure you enable display of all hidden files.

go into WinExplorer>select Tools>
Folder Options>View>click on Show hidden files and folders and
Uncheck Hide protected operating system files

HTH

Done all that, thanks - it's not the problem, in my case at any rate.

 

[Guest]

the total size is 170 gig and the Free space is 9.63 gig hope this helps
realy need to sort this out a.sa.p

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

One possibility is that this system has a ton (if you will) of very small files, but due to the file system allocating space based on cluster sizes, then you would have ton times x of waste space (now no longer free). A cluster being the minimal amount of space that would be allocated to the tiniest file. And cluster sizes vary upwards as the hard drives get larger & yours certainly qualifies to be called large.
Which finally, leads me to this: Having 1 single partition on a large HD is not ideal for conserving disk space. This leads to the "vanishing space problem".

Definition of cluster, as taken from Xp's Help and Support:
<Quote>
In data storage, the smallest amount of disk space that can be allocated to hold a file. All file systems used by Windows organize hard disks based on clusters, which consist of one or more contiguous sectors. The smaller the cluster size, the more efficiently a disk stores information. If no cluster size is specified during formatting, Windows picks defaults based on the size of the volume. These defaults are selected to reduce the amount of space that is lost and the amount of fragmentation on the volume. A cluster is also called an allocation unit.

</endquote>

This question has been covered before & really should be titled "Where has my HD space gone to". It's hard to tell what the specific combinations are on your HD.

See Technet article re Clusters & Default Cluster Sizes for Volumes with Windows XP File Systems
http://tinyurl.com/6z475

See this link to a Google archive (of MS group posts) & the section at bottom by Ken Blake, MS-MVP.
http://tinyurl.com/8yvnj

Is your system using NTFS or FAT32 file system?

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

One possibility is that this system has a ton (if you will) of very small files, but due to the file system allocating space based on cluster sizes, then you would have ton times x of waste space (now no longer free). A cluster being the minimal amount of space that would be allocated to the tiniest file. And cluster sizes vary upwards as the hard drives get larger & yours certainly qualifies to be called large.
Which finally, leads me to this: Having 1 single partition on a large HD is not ideal for conserving disk space. This leads to the "vanishing space problem".

Definition of cluster, as taken from Xp's Help and Support:
<Quote>
In data storage, the smallest amount of disk space that can be allocated to hold a file. All file systems used by Windows organize hard disks based on clusters, which consist of one or more contiguous sectors. The smaller the cluster size, the more efficiently a disk stores information. If no cluster size is specified during formatting, Windows picks defaults based on the size of the volume. These defaults are selected to reduce the amount of space that is lost and the

amount of fragmentation on the volume. A cluster is also called an allocation unit.

</endquote>

This question has been covered before & really should be titled "Where has my HD space gone to". It's hard to tell what the specific combinations are on your HD.

See Technet article re Clusters & Default Cluster Sizes for Volumes with Windows XP File Systems
http://tinyurl.com/6z475

See this link to a Google archive (of MS group posts) & the section at bottom by Ken Blake, MS-MVP.
http://tinyurl.com/8yvnj

Is your system using NTFS or FAT32 file system?

Try turning off system restore and see if your space is returned to you.
You will lose all restore points, though. This worked for me in a
similar situation.

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Instead of that, reduce the space allocation for System Restore. See My Computer >Properties>System Restore Tab.
Disk Space to use is expressed as a percentage of your system drive. See what that converts to in MB.
That amount is the maximum amount, and over time the oldest restore point gets replaced by the newest.

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

Instead of that, reduce the space allocation for System Restore. See My Computer >Properties>System Restore Tab.
Disk Space to use is expressed as a percentage of your system drive. See what that converts to in MB.
That amount is the maximum amount, and over time the oldest restore point gets replaced by the newest.

If the problem is the same as I have, reducing the amount of space
allowed to system restore does nothing to resolve it. Each time I re-
boot, the disk usage has gone up by a further (roughly) 0.7GB even when
my restore space allocation is set to, say, 400MB. And new restore
points are not created each timeso what system restore is doing with the
space I have no idea. I noticed it when I had used up 59GB of my 70GB
partition (C. Turning off system restore immediately got me back to
a usage of 25GB, about what I expected. Leaving system restoe off from
that point resolved the problem (except that I don't have any restore
point, of course). Turning system restore on again, and the problem
reappears.

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

For me, it's very difficult to understand or accept that Sys Restore service would be grabbing 30-odd GB of HD space --- given that one has set a limit for it. However, if you have very large HD, it's possible a setting at 10% of space (for example) would amount to several GB.

Now, Sam, you have turned off System Restore. But for others, (a) make sure Windows Explorer has view options to show all hidden files & folders. In Windows Explorer, find and Right click on "C:\System Volume Information" folder. Select Properties. Look at Total Size on disk.

Sam: I'd suggest you look at the size of your Pagefile.sys on your C drive (C:\ ). And check on the setting for Virtual Memory.
And, if you do not use hibernation, see if C:\ has a Hiberfil.sys. If found, turn off hibernation.

btw, My Sys Restore only has 8 restore points. Sys restore points take up only 644 MB.
[/QUOTE]
If the problem is the same as I have, reducing the amount of space
allowed to system restore does nothing to resolve it. Each time I re-
boot, the disk usage has gone up by a further (roughly) 0.7GB even
when my restore space allocation is set to, say, 400MB. And new
restore points are not created each timeso what system restore is
doing with the space I have no idea. I noticed it when I had used up
59GB of my 70GB partition (C. Turning off system restore
immediately got me back to a usage of 25GB, about what I expected.
Leaving system restoe off from that point resolved the problem
(except that I don't have any restore point, of course). Turning
system restore on again, and the problem reappears.[/QUOTE]

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

For me, it's very difficult to understand or accept that Sys Restore service would be grabbing 30-odd GB of HD space --- given that one has set a limit for it. However, if you have very large HD, it's possible a setting at 10% of space (for example) would amount to several GB.

Now, Sam, you have turned off System Restore. But for others, (a) make sure Windows Explorer has view options to show all hidden files & folders. In Windows Explorer, find and Right click on "C:\System Volume Information" folder. Select Properties. Look at Total Size on disk.

Sam: I'd suggest you look at the size of your Pagefile.sys on your C drive (C:\ ). And check on the setting for Virtual Memory.
And, if you do not use hibernation, see if C:\ has a Hiberfil.sys. If found, turn off hibernation.

btw, My Sys Restore only has 8 restore points. Sys restore points take up only 644 MB.

Thanks Maurice. There is a hiberfil (although I don't use hibernation),
it is about 500MB. The pagefile is about 750MB - it is set to be
"system managed". Neither of these files has changed size for a long
time.

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Sam,

Given you do not use hibernation, you can recover that 500 MB of space. Go into Control Panel. Drill down to Power Options (you'll see it on Classic View. Otherwise, in Category view, 1st go to Performance & Maintenance).

In Power Options, click to select the Hibernate Tab. In the Hibernate block, un-select the "Enable hibernation".
Apply changes. Restart your system. Look again for Hiberfil.sys. It should be gone. If not, delete it.

On virtual memory's Pagefile, for most people, the system managed setting is ok.
For the more computer savvy, you might manage to tweak the Pagefile.
The absolute best article on this topic is "Virtual Memory in Windows XP by Alex Nichol".
http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.htm

Digest/review that article. It will help you should you be inclined to modify the Pagefile size.
[/QUOTE]
Thanks Maurice. There is a hiberfil (although I don't use
hibernation), it is about 500MB. The pagefile is about 750MB - it is
set to be "system managed". Neither of these files has changed size
for a long time.[/QUOTE]

 

[Sam]

Maurice N ~ MVP said ...

Sam,

Given you do not use hibernation, you can recover that 500 MB of space. Go into Control Panel. Drill down to Power Options (you'll see it on Classic View. Otherwise, in Category view, 1st go to Performance & Maintenance).

In Power Options, click to select the Hibernate Tab. In the Hibernate block, un-select the "Enable hibernation".
Apply changes. Restart your system. Look again for Hiberfil.sys. It should be gone. If not, delete it.

On virtual memory's Pagefile, for most people, the system managed setting is ok.
For the more computer savvy, you might manage to tweak the Pagefile.
The absolute best article on this topic is "Virtual Memory in Windows XP by Alex Nichol".
http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.htm

Digest/review that article. It will help you should you be inclined to modify the Pagefile size.

Thanks, Maurice - may switch off hibernation. However, of course my
system restore issue remains unresolved :-(

 

[Guest]

just to say thanks to all thats helped me out .ive got it sorted now i
deleted all temp folders & turned system restore off then back on and i got
all my missing hhd back.......... Thanks once again

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Chunk,
Glad to be of some assistance. You are welcome.

 

[Sam]

chunk said ...

just to say thanks to all thats helped me out .ive got it sorted now i
deleted all temp folders & turned system restore off then back on and i got
all my missing hhd back.......... Thanks once again

Good - I suggest you monitor your disk usage however, and make sure it
isn't creeping upwards everytime you re-boot (as happens to me if system
restore is kept switched on).