Why is there a recycle bin on second drive

W

WhiteTea

Why does XP put a recycle bin on a second drive that doesn't have an
OS on it ?

Everytime I delete a file, it goes to both recycle bins.

Thanks,
Andy
 
L

Lem

WhiteTea said:
Why does XP put a recycle bin on a second drive that doesn't have an
OS on it ?

Everytime I delete a file, it goes to both recycle bins.

Thanks,
Andy

Because this is the Win XP default.

If you don't want it there, right-click on the Recycle Bin. On the
Global tab, click the radio button to "Configure drives independently.
Then, on the tab for each drive where you don't want a Recycle Bin,
check the box to "Do not move files to the Recycle Bin. Remove files
immediately when deleted."

--
Lem -- MS-MVP

To the moon and back with 2K words of RAM and 36K words of ROM.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Guidance_Computer
http://history.nasa.gov/afj/compessay.htm
 
J

John John - MVP

WhiteTea said:
Why does XP put a recycle bin on a second drive that doesn't have an
OS on it ?

Everytime I delete a file, it goes to both recycle bins.

Actually it doesn't. The files don't really go to the Recycle Bin, they
(sort of) go to the Recycler folder. The Recycler folder is just an
index of sorts. When files are deleted on a drive the Recycler folder
on that drive holds the index for the deleted files, the Recycle Bin
just combines the indexes from all the Recycler folders and presents the
contents to the user as a single index.

You can try this little test and you will quickly see that the bins are
really separate:

Create and delete test files from each drive, then from a Command Prompt
run the following commands: This command can be run from the root
folder of the individual drives:

dir /s /a recycler

Or from any location just add the full path, for example:

dir /s /a x:\recycler

Now take a close look at the results of the commands.

John
 
W

WhiteTea

Because this is the Win XP default.

If you don't want it there, right-click on the Recycle Bin.  On the
Global tab, click the radio button to "Configure drives independently.
Then, on the tab for each drive where you don't want a Recycle Bin,
check the box to "Do not move files to the Recycle Bin. Remove files
immediately when deleted."

I had already done that.
 
W

WhiteTea

Actually it doesn't.  The files don't really go to the Recycle Bin, they
(sort of) go to the Recycler folder. The Recycler folder is just an
index of sorts.  When files are deleted on a drive the Recycler folder
on that drive holds the index for the deleted files, the Recycle Bin
just combines the indexes from all the Recycler folders and presents the
contents to the user as a single index.

You can try this little test and you will quickly see that the bins are
really separate:

Create and delete test files from each drive, then from a Command Prompt
run the following commands:  This command can be run from the root
folder of the individual drives:

dir /s /a recycler

Or from any location just add the full path, for example:

dir /s /a x:\recycler

Now take a close look at the results of the commands.

John

I did put this in my first post, but the second drive was a FAT 32.

I used a dir. command to verify that there were no bytes being used in
the Recycled directory.

Andy
 
J

John John (MVP)

WhiteTea said:
I did put this in my first post,

You did? I guess I need new glasses, I saw nothing of that mentioned in
your post...

but the second drive was a FAT 32.

all the same, just that the Recycler folder will be named Recycled on
FAT32 drives.

I used a dir. command to verify that there were no bytes being used in
the Recycled directory.

Did you use the proper switches with the Dir command, without the proper
switches the command doesn't show hidden system files. If the folder
was empty then there were no deleted files on the drive, the Recycle Bin
was emptied so the folder was empty when you ran the command.

John
 
W

WhiteTea

You did?  I guess I need new glasses, I saw nothing of that mentioned in
your post...


all the same, just that the Recycler folder will be named Recycled on
FAT32 drives.


Did you use the proper switches with the Dir command, without the proper
switches the command doesn't show hidden system files.  If the folder
was empty then there were no deleted files on the drive, the Recycle Bin
was emptied so the folder was empty when you ran the command.

John

Typing attrib with no switches shows all files with all attributes.

Andy
 
J

Jose

Why does XP put a recycle bin on a second drive that doesn't have an
OS on it ?

Everytime I delete a file, it goes to both recycle bins.

Thanks,
             Andy

XP puts a recycle bin on both drives because that's the way it is by
design. You can read all about it if you do a Google search for: xp
recycle bin

On my system if I delete a file on C, it goes into the RB on C.
If I delete a file on D, it goes into the RB on D.

I proved this by doing a dir /a on the RECYCLER folder on C after
deleting a file on C. There was a modification to a folder with the
current time, but not in the RECYCLER on D. I don't care what is
really in the folder.

If I deleted a file on D, the current time showed up in a folder in
the RECYCLER folder on D, but not on C.

The file goes to the RECYCLER folder on the drive where it was
deleted. Easy to prove.

From the desktop, the is one Recycle Bin for the user interface, but
(like Lem says) you can set the properties for the RB on C and D, but
why mess with something that is probably working just fine? If I open
my desktop Recycle Bin, everything looks acceptable.

Is something on your system not working and you think it has something
to do with the Recycle Bin?

If you "already did that", describe what you see that does not make
sense to you.

Please explain why you think when you delete a file it goes to both
recycle bins.
 

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