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General discussion

Hard Drive Problem

Feb 28, 2004 6:27AM PST

I was doing a system restore and after a while I went to clean up my temp folder I noticed that my hard drive space had shunk dramatically I tried to do the system restore again and again the same thing happened.Now I have a 40 GB hard drive that is now down to 3.92 GB of free space.Does anybody know what is going on here and can anyone help?It seems that the files for some reason every time I did the system restore were being copied,and where the copied files are being stored I don't know I have looked everywhere.Thanx!

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Re:Hard Drive Problem
Feb 29, 2004 2:54PM PST

I am having basically the same situation. I turned on my computer a couple of days ago and all I got was blue OE and OD screens. I couldn't launch any of my programs. The computer started up and that was about it. I tried "Old Faithful" Gateway GoBack which had worked fantistically and saved my butt on several other occasions. Due to overload....I HAD NO GOBACK HISTORY AT ALL!!!I spoke with Microsoft who told me that my partition information had somehow gotten changed. I was instructed to partition my hard disk using a DOS partition, format and then reinstall Windows 98SE. I couldn't find any step by step info on the procedure, so equipped with my total ignorance about doing any of this, I took a stab at it (I had nothing else to loose........except for my sanity) and somehow I got through it and made my computer work. Or so I thought. I couldn't install any of my printing or desktop programs due to insufficient drive space. I took a look at my C Drive and it read 1.99GB. What happened to the rest of my 20GB I had before? Could it have eloped with your missing GB's???

If anyone can help or knows where I can find step-by-step detailed instructions to fix this I would be eternally grateful. Until then I will remain my usual "clueless" self. Thanks!! TC

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Re:Re:Hard Drive Problem
Mar 1, 2004 3:33AM PST

Since you have W98SE, it appears that the goback program may have created a hidden system file (or more) that you haven't got set to be viewed...or it may have created a hidden partition. I don't use that program so I'm not familiar with how it works.

First go to View in the Windows Explorer Toolbar, then click View again on the tabs...take the check mark out of "hide system files" and put a check mark in 'show all files'...click Apply, and click near the top the button that says "apply to all folders" or "like current folder"....click OK.

Now go to Search/Find - Files and Folders, go to Advanced and look for files larger than 30MB or so and if you locate any of the GoBack backups, delete them all to recover your diskspace. Empty the recycle bin if you have to after each one. Then create a new backup after rebooting the computer.

If this doesn't work, let me know and I will give you more info that might help.

TONI

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Re:Hard Drive Problem
Mar 1, 2004 3:43AM PST

Go to Search/Find - Files and Folders and do a search for RESTORE and you should see some files show up that begin with RestorePoint...along with a folder. Open the folder and you will see many restore points folders. I'm assuming (since I've never used a restore yet) that the lowest number represents the oldest restore point and that you can delete the oldest ones to recover your harddrive space....however, if you have partitions, some of those restore points might deal with those partitions so try to read files inside each of those folders before deleting to make sure you are deleting stuff you don't need.

I would suggest that you go to to the MS Knowledge Base and read up on the restore points issues before doing anything. You might also find information about this in the HELP button on the Start Button about how to delete and what to delete safely.

TONI