_Restore folder

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Erin - 29 May 2004 15:43 GMT

Am having issues with my hard drive space. I have a 60gb
hard drive and 40+gb is in this hidden _Restore folder.
Over 36gb is in the temp folder. What is this temp folder
and can I delete it? It has a bunch of .cpy files from
years ago. A second question is if I have devoted only
400mb to my _restore file, how can it get to 40gb? Thanks
to anyone whom can help.
Erin

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Mike M - 29 May 2004 15:58 GMT

The _RESTORE folders shouldn't occupy more than 12% of your C: drive (or 400MB
if the drive is <4GB). If more than that it would appear that System Restore
is not discarding (FIFOing) older data correctly, possibly because at some
time the system was not immediately rebooted following a state change
(switching SR either off or on). In your case the archive is clearly totally
bust given the size of the _RESTORE\TEMP folder perhaps due to your having
malware from Norton installed on your PC. Personally I'm somewhat surprised
that you aren't also reporting that you are seeing the "Cannot upgrade file %1
from %2 %1: %2" error message each time you boot your PC.

So, my first suggestion is to reset System Restore:
To reset System Restore:
System | Performance | File System | Troubleshooting and check "Disable System
Restore", Apply and IMMEDIATELY reboot. This will flush you restore folder
and erase all checkpoints, then,
System | Performance | File System | Troubleshooting and uncheck "Disable
System Restore", Apply and again IMMEDIATELY reboot. This should now
automatically create a new checkpoint immediately following the restart.
Finally adjust the space allocated to the restore folder as explained earlier.

If this doesn't clear down the _restore archive (and it doesn't always when
users have experienced similar problems) the next suggestion is to boot to DOS
using a floppy and delete the entire _RESTORE folder structure from there:
a) Boot to DOS using a floppy. Do NOT choose "Minimal Boot" from the menu
when booting from a floppy but rather choose "Start computer with (or without)
CD-ROM support" otherwise the ATTRIB command will not be available.
b) At the DOS A:\> prompt, type:

ATTRIB -H -S -R C:\_RESTORE
REN C:\_RESTORE OLDREST

c) Remove the floppy
d) Reboot your PC
e) Delete the folder C:\OLDREST
f) Check that an automatic system restore checkpoint was created.
g) Finally adjust the space allocated to the restore folder:

Finally you may want to give system restore the once over by carrying out the
following quick test.
a) Create a shortcut on your desktop to a file.
b) Create a manual checkpoint
c) Delete the shortcut
d) Restore you PC to the checkpoint you created.
Was the shortcut restored? Did you see any error messages?
--
Mike Maltby MS-MVP
mcmaltby@hotmail.com

> Am having issues with my hard drive space. I have a 60gb
> hard drive and 40+gb is in this hidden _Restore folder.
[quoted text clipped - 4 lines]
> to anyone whom can help.
> Erin

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erin - 29 May 2004 16:11 GMT

What is wierd is that I try to go thru the troubleshooting
and disable system restore is already checked (if its
checked, why is it throwing data into the file anyway?).
I go the other way and enable it, and then reboot. When I
do that and come back in, the disable box is checked. I
did this twice and both times the box was checked upon re-
entry. Its like the computer will not let me change this
setting. When I go into the area to adjust the amount of
space devoted to restore, it is grayed out (I assume since
the computer will not let me enable system restore).
I know that I have never messed with this before in the
past. Can the temp file just be deleted (this is where
36gb resides)?
Thanks for the time.

>-----Original Message-----
>The _RESTORE folders shouldn't occupy more than 12% of your C: drive (or 400MB
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
>and erase all checkpoints, then,
>System | Performance | File System | Troubleshooting and

uncheck "Disable

>System Restore", Apply and again IMMEDIATELY reboot. This should now
>automatically create a new checkpoint immediately following the restart.
[quoted text clipped - 38 lines]
>
>.

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Mike M - 29 May 2004 16:31 GMT

Why? From my pepvious post:

>> possibly because at some time the system was not immediately rebooted
>> following a state change (switching SR either off or on). In your case

<snip>

>> perhaps due to your having malware from Norton installed on your
>> PC.

As for your query. My original post explains what you need to do and how to do
it. Start at the beginning and continue to the end. :-)

Signature

Mike Maltby MS-MVP
mcmaltby@hotmail.com

> What is wierd is that I try to go thru the troubleshooting
> and disable system restore is already checked (if its
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> 36gb resides)?
> Thanks for the time.

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erin - 29 May 2004 16:55 GMT

Thanks for the help. This may sound real stupid, but how
do I boot to dos per your email. I know how to pull up
the dos prompt, but not sure what "boot to dos" entails.
Thanks for the assistance.

>-----Original Message-----
>Why? From my pepvious post:
[quoted text clipped - 24 lines]
>
>.

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Rick T - 29 May 2004 17:08 GMT

> Thanks for the help. This may sound real stupid, but how
> do I boot to dos per your email. I know how to pull up
> the dos prompt, but not sure what "boot to dos" entails.
> Thanks for the assistance.

Booting using a floppy disk: when you (or somebody) installed Windows on
your computer you made an Emergency Boot Disk, which contains WinME
booting files, basic drivers and utilities.

You can make one in ControlPanel/AddRemovePrograms/StartupDisk or by
surfing over to www.bootdisk.com and downloading their WinME OEM
disk-making program.

Put the floppy disk in the floppy disk drive and (re)boot. If,
perchance, the Windows GUI starts up then go into your system BIOS and
change the Booting Order to FD, CD, HD.

Rick

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