can't account for hard drive usage

I cannot seem to account for the space on my hd. I have a 120 gig hd and checked all my files, recycle bin, have hidden files viewable, everything I can think of and cannot account for 70 gigs of space being used somewhere, I don't know where. After tallying up all my folders and files I am using approx 27 gigs of space. Now the way I figure, 27 from 120 leaves me 93 gigs give or take a few. I have and show only 22 gigs free. What am I missing here? Thanks

Ray

 

Are you tallying file size or size used on the drive?

Files do not always (most of the time) do not occupy space equal to their actual size.

Hard drive space is allocated in units whose size is determined by, among other things, the size of the drive, and the file system type.

A 1 byte file will occupy the minimum file allocation unit size. If the file allocation unit is 4kbytes, every 1 byte file will actually occupy 4k bytes.

Example. I open a command window and create a text file called hello.txt

copy con: hello.txt
hello
^Z

If I do a dir of the file

05/01/2009 01:29 PM 7 hello.txt

It's shows as a 7 byte file.

If I look at the file size in Explorer, it shows as a 1KB file (minimum granularity of Explorer.)

However, if I right click and look at the file properties, it shows:

Size: 7 bytes
Size on disk 4.00KB (4096 bytes)

This may not specifically account for your discrepancy, but it calls into question the way that you may be accounting for the size of the data on your drive.

Odd sized files will be rounded up to the nearest file allocation multiple.

 

I am clicking on properties of say "my documents" and I can read in the properties size 11 gigs. This is how I am determining the sizes of my files.

 

Don't forget that you have other things that are occupying space, such as swap space, etc. that are not reported as files.

If you right click on the C: drive, the pie chart is the most accurate (that I know of) measure of disk usage.

It should correspond with the numbers in the Disk management window in Control Panel.

What does Disk Management report as the capacity of the drive and the free space?

 

Disk management agrees with my c drive properties. That is what I am saying it can't be right. If it is then please tell me what is using all my hard drive, because I am not. Where did it go? I have a few files on the hd and the resst is I don't know where.....don't know where they are hiding, and who iss using them? This pc is only used by myself alone.

Ray

 

The only other thing I can think of to do would be to run chkdsk from all of you logical drives and compare the results.

Output will look something like this:

67111505 KB total disk space.
41874384 KB in 115391 files.
100476 KB in 5789 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
754685 KB in use by the system.
65536 KB occupied by the log file.
24381960 KB available on disk.

4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
16777876 total allocation units on disk.
6095490 allocation units available on disk.

 

Assuming your hdd is ok & has no unrecoverable sectors (deteriorating hard disk surfaces can cause this) & assuming you don't have a second partition,one has to assume there is a folder or folders somewhere that perhaps was made when installing certain software or even files that microsoft may have made when updating from one service pack to another etc as it will make a backup in case you need to revert,perhaps even downloads that you may not have deleted ,so below is a simple tree style file explorer that will give a list in a tree & the size of each file on your hdd to hopefully locate the culprit

Every hard disk is too small if you just wait long enough. TreeSize Free tells you where precious space has gone to. TreeSize Free can be started from the context menu of a folder or drive and shows you the size of this folder, including its subfolders. Each folder can be expanded in Explorer-like style to see the size of its subfolders. Scanning is done in a thread, so you can already see results while TreeSize is working. The space, which is wasted by the file system can be displayed and the results can be printed in a report


http://download.cnet.com/TreeSize-Free/3000-2248_4-81064.html

 

In Vista, many folders are not viewable by default, even when selecting "properties" These folders report as 0k, but can actualy have many GB in them. Also, NTFS seems to loose space over time. After my 250GB filled up, I copied it's contents to my 750GB. I then deleted everything I had copied. Then I emptied out the recycle bins. The only thing left was a pair of empty recycle folders and "system volume information". Combined, these were less than 1MB. However, drive properties showed 20GB used! The only way to get this space back was to format the drive. I have noticed that my 500GB is starting to have a similar issue, but that is ok as I am about to replace my 500s with 1500s anyway. Unless you have been using the drive for at least4 years, I doubt you would have lost a full 70GB to this glitch.

 

Re: Having a second partition. Is this something a program may have done without my knowledge? I always thought I had to partition my hd myself. I hafe a program I am using called rx rollback. Wondering if it is using my space, but if so should I not be able to see these folders? I have tried the tree size and still cannot account for the 70 missing gigs..

 

Re: Having a second partition. Is this something a program may have done without my knowledge? I always thought I had to partition my hd myself. I hafe a program I am using called rx rollback. Wondering if it is using my space, but if so should I not be able to see these folders? I have tried the tree size and still cannot account for the 70 missing gigs.. Also, I am running XP.

 

No you have to create the partition

Do you have system restore turned on,try doing a clean up of those points,quickest way to get there

open My Computer or hover mouse over C if you have menu enabled

right click C & then left clik properties

Click on DISK CLEANUP up to bring up menu,once scan is finished another menu will appear click on the MORE OPTIONS tab,at the bottom clik on Cleanup restore points

The other way to get there is from system tools in ALL PROGS list

Do you have hibernation enabled,UNCHECK the box,you get to that by power options it's the 3rd tab over

Recycle bin size is set at 12% when xp is first installed,you can adjust the size by right clik on the bin then clik properties

Install ccleaner & run both buttons at the left top,make sure all boxes are ticked

 

turn off hibernation.
reduce recycling bin to 5%
manually manage your page file
turn off or reduce indexing size.
reduce the amount of restore points you computer makes.

if these suggestions don't work.

it might be your HDD is telling you the size of space allocated not free space. your using 27GB not 27 GB left.

 

scorpNZ,
I do not use system restore, it is turned off, because I use rollback rx pro. Did disk cleanup freeed up 1.1 gig.
I do not use hibernation mode so that is unchecked.
My recycle bin is set to 10%
Still can't account for used space.
You mentioned in an earlier post something about unrocoverable sectors on my hd. How can I check my hd for problems?

Still working on ccleaner.

 

also it is known to me, that sometimes your SB chipset may misinterpret HDD size.

a test if you would copy all the biggest files you can find to you hdd,

i had a client's machine that would actually report data in the negatives.

 

You use the check disk in windows & when finished it will provide a report

When you right click on C & hit properties what amount of space is used & what's free


http://www.infopackets.com/news/hardware/2004/20040917_repair_damaged_sectors_on_a_hard_drive.htm

 

Used Space: 87.4
Free Space: 24.3

 

Don't forget to check the size of the rx roll back save folder some of those older saves could be put on a dvd then deleted

 

Now we are getting somewhere. Do you know where these files are kept. I have had no luck finding these files.....

 

No i don't know,however they more than likely are hidden in it's own folder in C & quite possibly encrypted,you'll need to read it's instructions in clearing old saves

 

scorpNZ
Ok read the best info I can get and all I can't understand any of this:

"When RollBack Rx is installed, it writes its snapshots directly onto the sectors of the hard drive. These snapshots are not saved as "Files", but rather as sector maps. Its' sector based mapping is written in a form that is invisible to Windows. Since these sector maps are not saved as files or folders - Windows CAN NOT see them..."

Does this make any sense to you? And if so do you really think I could have 60 or so of gig space being used by this software? I thought windows seees and controls all on my hd....
Do you know what a sector map is??? I am enclosing a link where I got this info, which is located lower in the replys. Hoping it makes sense to you.