1 year old HP laptop, 1TB HD, don't know how long it's been there but saw that 700GB is being used in 2 separate folders, all numbers and letters no names to the files, ran troubleshoot, Ccleaner, don't know what it is except MS on that page said those 2 files could not be characterized and may affect my computer. All the files that show up are 221.184kb, about 40 lines worth, doesn't even add up from files I can see. I don't game, don't download movies, music, 99% of the use of the laptop is checking email and web surfing and watching Netflix or Youtube videos. I've seen this issue posted in a few places, not here, but other forums and no one has found an answer. I should only have maybe 80-100GB used, if that. The only place it shows up is in settings and "Other folders", C:\dJbpM_!O2OvW!eS`YA is using 379GB. C:\5GQF85RjZ40H6CXelz is using 327GB . Any ideas? Thanks in advance.
With all the time the OP has apparently spent troubleshooting this issue, a reinstall would have been quicker. One should always do an assessment of the quickest way to get a system running again, if it's a system you're dependent on. Even if finding the problem is an interesting intellectual exercise.
A PC should always be ready for a reinstall. You never know what you'll get hit by.
my 2c worth of opinion...
mikeymikec
Lifer
- May 19, 2011
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A reinstall has its own potential for problems (and even the same problem to begin with - what if the OP installed some bit of software that resulted in that tonne of files), especially for someone who isn't particularly knowledgeable. Also, considering that the nature of this problem so far is "Can I delete these files?" (questions like "how did the files get there?" are also important yet can likely be answered by a knowledgeable person briefly looking at those files), reinstalling IMO seems like a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
I kind of agree with your notion that "a PC should always be ready for a reinstall", because I think that users should be able to understand what it takes to essentially 'move house' (with regard to their personal data at least), though I think handing out reinstalls like candy tends to perpetuate ideas that Windows somehow needs that.
I agree with your sentiment, but we don't know if there is a malware infection in play. See my first post in this thread.
That's the whole point. Personal files and data should always be decoupled from the system itself. Who knows? You could f.x. also get hit by ransomware tomorrow, or you HDD could fail. The only safeguard against that is having important data elsewhere (backup, external drive, SD card etc.)
As for reinstalls, Windows haven't "required" such since Win9x. Windows is actually fairly resilient, particularly 7 and newer. But that isn't the whole story. A reinstall is often the easiest and quickest way to get Windows working again. You could of course clean up such manually, but doing so requires a good deal of specialist knowledge, and "arcane" command prompts. Which I'd trust less to get a normal user running again, then the Windows Installer. Which with 10 has never been easier to use.
mikeymikec
Lifer
- May 19, 2011
- 20,218
- 14,827
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That's a big and baseless 'if', and I'm pretty sceptical about the likelihood of someone dumping/storing a tonne of useful files on a random person's computer, filling up most of its storage capacity - as if that's not going to go unnoticed for most users.
But if the issue is anything more complicated than a one-off software malfunction, the user could be setting themselves up for repeat performances of reinstalling, which I've often seen on these forums. Reinstalling erases useful evidence for troubleshooting problems, and potentially wastes a heck of a lot of time depending on the spec of the computer and the speed of the Internet connection. Also given how Windows 10 basically says "I'm going to try and saturate your Internet connection and I'm not going to give you any choice in the matter", the user could be waiting ages for something essential to download, and another day of troubleshooting is gone (assuming a full-time job elsewhere) on a wild goose chase. For all we know the OP has a Celeron or similar CPU, 4GB RAM (we already know it's a HDD-booting laptop, so it's not the quickest of cats) and three security suites all running at once because that's the way they like it.
Doesn't have to be a person as such. Logs and temporary files from various stuff have been known to fill drives without much warning.
Fair enough. I'm properbly biased towards getting things back in working order, rather then doing real in-depth troubleshooting. Lets call it a work related injury...
VirtualLarry
No Lifer
- Aug 25, 2001
- 56,570
- 10,205
- 126
Has OP checked Disk Indexing yet? It has been known to sometimes go "haywire", and build HUGE indexes. Though, I don't know why those indexes would be in named directories like that hanging off of the C-colon.
wow long speech.. OK how about make a image of the incredibly interesting full spinner hd install so you can boot it back up!.. besides what part of installing to a SSD involves deleting anything on the hD? what part of installing windows / apps / update / make image of that too.. its not some great mystery he will figure out its just useless junk (*the numbers remind me of when people did ftp's on random peoples pc and would make tons of numbered folders really dont know why tho, to hide things from newbs? ) Anyway ya get a SSD
maybe even get a second laptop so you can keep this crippled OS for studying purposes.Mikeymikec and EkFenix and all the others who dedicated their time unselfishly, thank you all. My mom passed away 1 1/2 weeks ago and was my last parent. Dealing with the lawyer, POA, family members, the travel time, dividing the contents of the house and selling of the house has made it impossible to dedicate the time I need for this issue. I had thought that since it was so common that there was an easy fix, I'm up to 789GB on a 1 TB drive now. Nothing makes sense, no app is that big, no gaming, did massive anti-everything from boot-up to every line of code and nothing, not one improvement. I can't express enough how much I appreciate all your time invested in helping me, but this seems to be a common issue w/o a fix, if we did fix it, we would be the 1st that I've seen as no one has solved the issue yet either through MS or professional help, that tells me a solution has not been found yet. I will continue to search for a solution when I have time but until there is a definite fix, right now I don't have the time for doing what some of you want me to. This may have been an issue since new, I don't except many have this issue. If I can arrange to get a 2nd computer online, I'll try deleting both other files, but until then I'll have to live with it as is, all please keep me in mind if you see a solution and again thank you all so much for your gracious help. I'll be back in time to try to fix this as any search shows many with this issue. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart, seriously!
ubern00b
Member
- Jun 11, 2019
- 171
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Set your pagefile manually on your C: drive and disable hibernation, this should enable you to delete the folder with all that other junk in that for some reason has your pagefile and hyberfil in it, google will help you disable hibernation. Seems to be a windows update temp folder that has an old .Windows install and all the update junk though shouldn't be that big, however I have seen similar issues with the temp folders windows creates for updates where it seems to grow and grow for some reason, not a common error though that's where I would be putting my money if I was to hazard a guess.
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Mr Evil
Senior member
What you're describing here is the confusing way that browsers have merged the address and search inputs into one. If you type (or paste) some text into the bar at the top of a browser that is not a URL, it will do a search (in Google by default in many browsers), but if you type in something that it recognizes as a URL, it will load it and display it. Usually this means a web page, like if you type in "https://forums.anandtech.com" it will take you to this site, but if you type in something that begins with "file:///" it references something on your own computer. For instance, if you type "file:///C:/" it will show you a list of files on drive C. Giving the link to someone else won't work, because it will try to show the files on their drive C, which aren't the same as yours.
I think I'll go with the consensus here, and say that the simplest way to solve this is:
1) Back up anything important.
2) Make sure the files you've backed up can be used.
3) Format and reinstall.
Or you know, you could just boot Windows into safe mode or admin account or boot a Linux/ubuntu live CD/USB and just delete those two folders....They are trash. If you want, do a system image before. But after cleaning PCs for like 15 years now I'm sure deleting them shouldn't affect anything in your PC. I'll buy you a new PC if anything magically screws up. Shoot, or just repair it, because, you know, like I said, been doing this forever now. lol Programs that create directories like that are trash/Malware/virus and the data within are trash. Idk why not just spend 5 minutes and delete them and get it over with.
SSD Sean- I was looking forward to a new computer from you but you were right, safe mode and delete. It took a while and I had to run troubleshooting to get my internet connection back, but so fare email works , internet works, can open all my files, nothing seems to be missing so far and my storage went from 789GB to 75GB which is right where it should be. I'll update if I have any issues show up, thanks a lot and thanks to all the others who worked this issue. For those that thought it might be my slow computer, it's an I7 Quad-core, 2Ghz and 16GB Ram, I'm sure not as fast as all the stuff you guys were running but not out of date, I should have listed those details from the start. I'll run every program I can today to see if there is a glitch in this process but so far it appears everything in those 2 huge files were worthless junk, don't know how they got there but hope I can keep them from coming back and this was a one time issue.
What I’d suggest you do now is run these two commands to check for any corruption of windows files and if so, they can fix that too.
This: SFC /scannow
And this: Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/7808-use-dism-repair-windows-10-image.html
This: SFC /scannow
And this: Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/7808-use-dism-repair-windows-10-image.html
I already did the Dism as part of my checks and there was nothing, do you think I need to do it again if it was clean the 1st time and all the files are gone now?
Ok so you winner the HD race by far, I'm running the SFC anyway just for the fun of it, looks like a 20 min scan for me. I opted for the old 5400 rpm HD in exchange for the better processor, more Ram and the 1TB storage and for my use, I couldn't have made a better choice. It's very rare that my HD slows down anything for me, but I can see that for many the HD is more important depending on what you're doing, for me, I'm quite happy and it's 50% finished already. Thanks for your help, it's nice to have this issue over and done with!!!
P.S. Yeah 5400 rpm is laughable as that's what I had on my laptop 9 years ago, I would have at least got the 7200 rpm but wasn't available in my package deal and the HD isn't the choke point on my system as for my use it's only on rare occasions that it slows things down, for my use 99% of the time my system is lightning quick, but a toy compared to what many of what many of you have/need.
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After this, if you wanna push performance, i’d say to defrag while you sleep and you’re set.
Ideally, I’d swap in an SSD the first chance I could get. For real man, longer battery, 15-30 second boot with responsiveness as soon as you see the desktop. It’s worlds difference for me. I have an 8yr old i5 laptop that had a 5400rpm 1TB HDD and I changed that out to an SSD after the warranty went out. It changed the system entirely. SSDs are dirt cheap nowadays...upgrade
Ideally, I’d swap in an SSD the first chance I could get. For real man, longer battery, 15-30 second boot with responsiveness as soon as you see the desktop. It’s worlds difference for me. I have an 8yr old i5 laptop that had a 5400rpm 1TB HDD and I changed that out to an SSD after the warranty went out. It changed the system entirely. SSDs are dirt cheap nowadays...upgrade
After this, if you wanna push performance, i’d say to defrag while you sleep and you’re set.
Ideally, I’d swap in an SSD the first chance I could get. For real man, longer battery, 15-30 second boot with responsiveness as soon as you see the desktop. It’s worlds difference for me. I have an 8yr old i5 laptop that had a 5400rpm 1TB HDD and I changed that out to an SSD after the warranty went out. It changed the system entirely. SSDs are dirt cheap nowadays...upgrade
I did the SFC and DISM and were perfect, after the defrag was 2%, it was never above 5% before all this. I see your point about SSD and upgrading but I like things to last as long as they can and keep fixing it as long as it's at a reasonable cost. My B-Day is coming up, it would make a nice gift, hint, hint
. Just kidding. Things are smoking on this machine and I couldn't be happier. I could even get by with my 9 year old Dell on XP since I use encryption, VPN and a few other tricks, its my on the road Laptop, but I see your point. Wish I could have got at least a 7200 rpm HD on this as 5400 is just slow in scanning but I plan around it and it works great for me and as of now, no choke points. Still wishing it wouldn't have worked and would be looking for that free Laptop you offered. I'm thrilled it's fixed, thanks to all, especially SSD Sean, not that the other ideas wouldn't have worked, they probably would have but this was quick and very easy, thanks again everyone.I will second the individual that mentioned it could be malware designed to use your computer to mine cryptocurrency...I'm currently looking at a desktop computer with a 3TB hard drive inside that has 504GB free and this PC is only used for payroll software and might be used to access the internet once every month. It turns out this computer was setup on their network to be their DMZ machine, and someone was able to exploit this to install malware on the machine and setup a hacked version of Nicehash to leverage the computer's processing power to mine BTC/Ethereum cryptocurrency. Originally the computer owner deleted all of the files on the drive but within 2 months almost 2TB of data was taken over again. We ended up reformatting the computer as well as going into the router settings and disabling the DMZ option so that no one except for people from the internal network could gain access to the computer and this has solved all of the issues of the missing HD space. As for proof, their enterprise-level router keeps logs of all in and out traffic, and over 97% of the internet traffic was being diverted to that one machine and was being accessed by tens of thousands of different IP addresses all over the world - from China to Spain.
VirtualLarry
No Lifer
- Aug 25, 2001
- 56,570
- 10,205
- 126
Yeah, stuff like that can happen. I was specifically referring to BurstCoin, and a few others, that specifically used storage space as a mining tool, as part of some sort of "botnet".
NiceHash on it's own, normally, doesn't use much storage space (I don't think) to mine ETH. But if the machine was exploited, chances are it was being used as a BT "seedbox" as well, if it had a decent internet connection speed. (100Mbit/sec or faster.)
NiceHash on it's own, normally, doesn't use much storage space (I don't think) to mine ETH. But if the machine was exploited, chances are it was being used as a BT "seedbox" as well, if it had a decent internet connection speed. (100Mbit/sec or faster.)
IT'S BACK----for days the used space stayed around 70GB which is normal and actually went down as I removed some smaller files I didn't need. Yesterday I checked and it was at 890GB on my 1TB disk. On a hunch, I overwrote all the free space via a 7 times overwrite which is overkill as 1 would have worked and 3 would have been fine and likely unrecoverable. What I noticed is that when it was about 80% erased, it slowly increased to 922 GB and MS automatically turned on storage space, didn't see a change, but sometime in the last 15% it decreased back down to 70 GB. I had one warning from erasing the free space "This computer had system restore or volume shadow enabled, this may allow copies of files stored on the disk and pose a security concern. I had ran system runnow and Dism and both were perfect. I do recall that it bad to let Win10 hibernate or go to sleep as it will move everything you'r doing to the HD and not retrieve it when it wakes up, I have been letting it hibernate/sleep, I've since changed that and never let it sleep, either on or off, but how it came back, increased while erasing the free parts of the disk, then at the end went back to the normal? All the command line prompts I did before didn't show one single issue and I followed every day for a while to see how much HD was being used and it was normal so I stopped looking every day and wham, back worse than ever in 3 days and now, back to normal? Stranger still is when MS storage sense was turned on by MS, the storage use was climbing, it looked like I was really going have 0% available for a while, now normal. Again ran anti-everything and will do the command line prompts once again but this is just strange?
P.S. It likely happened when MS turned on Storage sense but my Recovery D: which is only like 30GB is up around 25GB when it use to run around 7GB, Win10 was just looking to store stuff anywhere when it looked like I was soon going to have a 1TB drive 100% full. Wondering if I should move stuff out of there as I've never had to tell with that as I only have 1 C: drive.
P.S. It likely happened when MS turned on Storage sense but my Recovery D: which is only like 30GB is up around 25GB when it use to run around 7GB, Win10 was just looking to store stuff anywhere when it looked like I was soon going to have a 1TB drive 100% full. Wondering if I should move stuff out of there as I've never had to tell with that as I only have 1 C: drive.
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Mr Evil
Senior member
So now we know what created the files. Software that overwrites free space will typically do so by writing files until there is no free space left. If the process is interrupted for some reason, then you are lef t with a bunch of randomly named files filled with random data taking up most of the space on your HDD.
I was the one who initiated the overwrite of unused disk space, no program did it. I thought that since so much disk space had been used, I wanted to clear the disk of all that junk. Prior to me overwriting, no program did it on it's own, but I see what you were saying.
I'm not really following. Kinda lost after reading what you wrote. So, you manually placed those files there (without using an application?) to try to overwrite the free space and are surprised they are still there when they didn't delete themselves? That doesn't make sense. lol
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