Strange disk space problem

[notalot]

Bit of a strange one, we have got several pc's that are running out of disk space for no apparent reason, they are fairly old 6-7 years, and 2 different makes of pc and are running Windows XP SP2.

 

The disks are 20GB and 30GB. The computers use up all the space that there is but when checking how much space is used using treesizefree, WinDirStat and unhiding everything and doing it threw the explorer it only shows that there is about 7GB used. Disk cleanup only clears some space because of the compression and the space is used up again over about a week.

 

When we did a chkdsk nothing was found wrong.

 

Any thoughts?

[Willott]

What's telling you that the disk is full (you've said that explorer says there's only 7GB on there, so it shouldn't be that throwing the error)?

[Guest TheLibrarian]

System Restore?

[Potato-Peeler]

Were you copying files over 4gb?

[notalot]

@ Willott

 

The System reports low disk space (in the bottom right hand corner) and on the properties on the C:, sorry bad description of the explorer, I selected all the files and folders on the root of C: and did properties.

 

@Librarian

 

System restore is disabled

 

@ Potato

 

Nope, the fault was reported because people can no longer logon as there is no free space to copy the profile localy

Edited November 24, 2009 by notalot

[mac_shinobi]

paging file ?

 

Using a linux live disc or bart pe disc of some description boot the computer up and delete pagefile.sys off the root of the drive and reboot and start up in windows - windows should re create it and see if its still the same ?

[notalot]

I dont think it's the pagefile thats showing up as 700MB but ill give it a try, in the morning Edited November 24, 2009 by notalot

[timzim]

Maybe bad sectors on the disk have been marked hidden so not picked up with chkdsk. Replace the HDDs or throw the computers in the dustbin (good excuse for a hardware refresh!).

[mac_shinobi]

short of that I would use delprof to clear out all the profiles excluding the default ones ie

 

All users

Administrators

Default User

 

which delprof normally or should ignore

 

If it still wont let them logon then I would go to a working pc , copy the Default User folder from c:\documents and settings

 

Then go to the computer that does not work and copy that over the Default User on the none working computer logged in as local admin and reboot and get user to try again.

[notalot]

@ timzim

 

Aye that’s one possibility solution id prefer not to just rip the HDD out until there are no other options

 

@ mac_shinobi

 

Did that one earlier cleared 500MB but thanks for the idea, it lets people login but doesnt fix the larger problem of 20GB missing

Edited November 24, 2009 by notalot

[Guest TheLibrarian]

Are the drives formatted NTFS?

 

FAT32 can have this issue if the PC is rebooted unexpectedly.

 

I don't know why people would install WXP on a FAT32 system, but it wouldn't be the first time I've seen it.

[notalot]

They are NTFS

[Guest TheLibrarian]

I'm out of ideas.

 

Here's what Microsoft say : How to locate and correct disk space problems on NTFS volumes in Windows XP