O.T. Missing Folder/files

I have a Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1,
with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender
and Windows firewall.

(1) TB HD
Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz
Ram 12.0 GB
System type : 64-bit operating system

I also have

I have a Dell Optiplex 780 Tower, with Windows 7 Professional,
SP1, with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender
and Windows firewall.

Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB
Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
System type : 64-bit operating system

and (external hard drives)

(8500)
WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200
RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
Hard Drive

(780)
Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB
Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5"
Internal Hard Drive




The problem lies with the 8500.


I inadvertently deleted or moved a
folder and I can't find it. Before I do
any more damage I thought I had better
post it here and maybe I can recover the
folder/files?


Thanks,
Robert

--
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus

Robert in CA wrote:
I have a Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1,
with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender
and Windows firewall.

(1) TB HD
Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz
Ram 12.0 GB
System type : 64-bit operating system

I also have

I have a Dell Optiplex 780 Tower, with Windows 7 Professional,
SP1, with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender
and Windows firewall.

Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB
Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
System type : 64-bit operating system

and (external hard drives)

(8500)
WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200
RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
Hard Drive

(780)
Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB
Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5"
Internal Hard Drive




The problem lies with the 8500.


I inadvertently deleted or moved a
folder and I can't find it. Before I do
any more damage I thought I had better
post it here and maybe I can recover the
folder/files?


Thanks,
Robert


You must stop using the partition immediately,
to avoid damage to the missing items. Like, don't use
Firefox or any other program which causes writes to
the C: with the "missing files".

https://www.ccleaner.com/recuva

The colored dot next to the file name, indicates
how damaged the file is. If it has already been
overwritten (the clusters reused by the file system),
the dot will be red. If the file is in perfect condition,
the dot will be green. A color of yellow is bad news too.

Let's draw an example to illustrate. This is the drive, when
the accident happens.

+-----+--------------------------------+
| MBR | C: Windows with deleted files |
+-----+--------------------------------+

Plug in your emergency boot drive, boot from it.

+-----+--------------------------------+
| MBR | C: Emergency Boot Drive | === download Recuva onto this one.
+-----+--------------------------------+ Then, point it to E: to scan.
Store the recovered files on C: of
Emergency Boot Drive, not on E:
+-----+--------------------------------+
| MBR | E: Windows with deleted files | === we're not running this one, we're
+-----+--------------------------------+ trying to recover the files while this
operates as a "data drive".

Now, maybe you would be sticking one drive inside
your machine, and the second drive in your USB enclosure.
But, you get the idea. C: would be inside the machine,
E: would be in the enclosure.

Note: Piriform is the company that invented Recuva. There are
many similar programs, it's not the only one. Piriform was
bought by Avast, and when you download Recuva, there is a
danger that other garbage software will get installed.
Read all prompts carefully, and do your best to avoid
getting unnecessary passengers from the Recuva installer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuva

Paul

I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using
the partition?

I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of
things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots
of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what
Favorites/folders/files are for?

Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500
but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the
download history.

When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to
download in another location, then the dialog box pops up
to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash
drive?

Then I run a scan from there correct?

Thanks,
Robert

On 3/24/2021 7:47 PM, Robert in CA wrote:
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using
the partition?

You stop as much disk activity as possible because when ANYTHING is written to
the disk there is a chance it will get written over one of your deleted files
and it will be gone forever.


I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of
things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots
of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what
Favorites/folders/files are for?

Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500
but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the
download history.

When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to
download in another location, then the dialog box pops up
to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash
drive?

Then I run a scan from there correct?

Thanks,
Robert



Robert:

I have used "restoration" in the past with good results.

https://www.download3k.com/Install-Restoration.html

The sooner you use it the better your chances of getting deleted files back.

BTW have you checked in the "Recycle Bin"?

If you think you have just MOVED it to some obscure place you can use the
"Search" function of Windows explorer. Enter a remembered folder or file name,
point it at the root of the disk drive (C:\) and check the "advanced" setting to
"Search Subfolders".

HTH & GL

John

--
\\\||///
------------------o000----(o)(o)----000o----------------
----------------------------()--------------------------
'' Madness takes its toll - Please have exact change. ''

Robert in CA wrote:
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using
the partition?

I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of
things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots
of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what
Favorites/folders/files are for?

Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500
but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the
download history.

When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to
download in another location, then the dialog box pops up
to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash
drive?

Then I run a scan from there correct?

Thanks,
Robert

The objective, is to treat the partition that had the accident,
as read-only.

The C: partition, while the machine is booted and Windows
is running, is constantly writing to C: . Maybe the search
indexer is running and doing writes.

If files are lost (accidental delete), you would shut down
the machine immediately. Now, we're not doing read or write.

You have other drives with a copy of the OS on them.
Imagine that drive is used to boot the computer. Now
the C: writes are happening to a partition you don't
care about. Using that drive, you download Recuva Free.
Install Recuva Free on that drive. Now you are ready to scan.

Now, connect the original drive, using a USB enclosure. There
is no constant activity to the enclosure when it is connected.
It's ready to do what you wish to it. It is treated as a data
drive, because it has not been used to boot the computer.

If you were to look in Disk Management, the swapped in drive has

+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } === the drive being used to boot
+-----+-----------------+------------+ Windows writes to this C:
Recovered files go to this drive,
until recovery from the other drive
is complete.
+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | | } === no special designations,
+-----+-----------------+------------+ now a "data" drive and ready
to be scanned with Recuva

Once you are sure you've Un-Deleted as many
files as the job requires, then it is "safe"
to write to the bottom drive, so that when
that drive becomes the main boot drive again,
the recovered materials are there for you to use.

You don't write to the bottom drive, until
you're absolutely sure each and every file
is intact, and no further forensics on the
bottom drive are needed. At that point, the
bottom drive is safe to write and update as
you wish.

Then, shut down the computer, and the bottom
drive can be put back inside the machine.

There is nothing special about being inside
or outside the machine. I'm just taking your
usual usage pattern into account. On my machines
here, pretty well all drive activity is
internal. If I needed to do this...

+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" }
+-----+-----------------+------------+
+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | | } === needs UnDelete
+-----+-----------------+------------+

it would be done with two adjacent trays that
slide in. I would need to know the names and
sizes of the drive, so I booted from the
correct one (the un-damaged one) and not
boot from the damaged one. We don't want
writes on the bottom one.

When a file is deleted, its resources can be
reused at any time. We seek to stop writing to the
drive, to protect those resources. If the resources
have not been tampered with, Recuva simply flips
a single byte value in the $MFT and the file is
instantly available again.

If you continue to write to the drive and
don't act quickly enough (use the drive for the
rest of the day), the freed-up clusters from the
files that were deleted, they get overwritten.
Even if you flipped the byte in the $MFT, the
file is corrupt. It is for this reason that
the filenames have the colored dots next to them.
A file with a "red dot", is unfit for recovery.
A file with a "green dot" or all the files having
"green dots", means you stopped usage of the
drive soon enough to keep them green. All it
would take, is writing one giant movie file,
to overwrite all the deleted files and turn
all the dots "red" and nothing could be recovered.

You can flip the byte on a "red" file and make
the file appear again in the listing. But if you
do that, practically none of the original data
is inside it. It contains portions of other files
that have been stored. Thus, if you open the file,
your picture viewer crashes or there are other
anomalies. You have to check the files. If the
files had green dots next to them, testing the
files should take only a short time. If the
files are red, expect trouble, and the testing
is likely to fail (and hopefully, in not too
spectacular a fashion - *don't* run tools with
built-in automated repair capability because
they can make a mess of a file with random bits
of other files in it). To test a file, you want
dumb tools that don't take liberties with the files.

Your data is there, but it is only there until
the clusters get overwritten. Every write operation
on the partition with the problem, risks overwriting
the freed-up resources. That's why there is a rush
to stop using that drive for writes. And the OS
loves to write to the drive. The more modern the
version of Windows, the more it likes to write.
An accidental deletion then, the files will be
unrecoverable in a short time, if the OS is
writing stuff to C: . That's why, if you notice
files are missing several days or a week later,
it's not very likely they're coming back. They'll
all have red dots next to their name. Or, if the
$MFT entries get reused (which happens!), not even
the file names will be locatable by Recuva. I've
watched how the $MFT is used, and it really doesn't
take that long for the filename to disappear either.

The other technique is scavenging. That's when Recuva
doesn't work, the filename is missing or the filename
is there but has a red dot. You can use Photorec and
scan the drive for "fragments of files". But the
output is such a mess, don't waste the time. I tried
once. I got 100,000 chunks of stuff, that when opened
were all corrupted and useless. It's wishful thinking
to think doing more work than the Recuva approach,
is going to pay off. If the file is still mostly intact,
flipping the $MFT byte brings it back. If it's damaged,
there's a good chance it is never coming back.

I've tested undelete, by deleting a JPEG and immediately
doing a scan, and the file was located and had a green dot.
So it can work. But don't be "testing it", until your
recovery project is complete. Then you can be messing
around if you want. You'll only get the one chance to
get these back, so concentrate on that.

Paul

On Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at 5:33:27 PM UTC-7, Paul wrote:
Robert in CA wrote:
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using
the partition?

I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of
things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots
of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what
Favorites/folders/files are for?

Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500
but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the
download history.

When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to
download in another location, then the dialog box pops up
to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash
drive?

Then I run a scan from there correct?

Thanks,
Robert
The objective, is to treat the partition that had the accident,
as read-only.

The C: partition, while the machine is booted and Windows
is running, is constantly writing to C: . Maybe the search
indexer is running and doing writes.

If files are lost (accidental delete), you would shut down
the machine immediately. Now, we're not doing read or write.

You have other drives with a copy of the OS on them.
Imagine that drive is used to boot the computer. Now
the C: writes are happening to a partition you don't
care about. Using that drive, you download Recuva Free.
Install Recuva Free on that drive. Now you are ready to scan.

Now, connect the original drive, using a USB enclosure. There
is no constant activity to the enclosure when it is connected.
It's ready to do what you wish to it. It is treated as a data
drive, because it has not been used to boot the computer.

If you were to look in Disk Management, the swapped in drive has

+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } === the drive being used to boot
+-----+-----------------+------------+ Windows writes to this C:
Recovered files go to this drive,
until recovery from the other drive
is complete.
+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | | } === no special designations,
+-----+-----------------+------------+ now a "data" drive and ready
to be scanned with Recuva

Once you are sure you've Un-Deleted as many
files as the job requires, then it is "safe"
to write to the bottom drive, so that when
that drive becomes the main boot drive again,
the recovered materials are there for you to use.

You don't write to the bottom drive, until
you're absolutely sure each and every file
is intact, and no further forensics on the
bottom drive are needed. At that point, the
bottom drive is safe to write and update as
you wish.

Then, shut down the computer, and the bottom
drive can be put back inside the machine.

There is nothing special about being inside
or outside the machine. I'm just taking your
usual usage pattern into account. On my machines
here, pretty well all drive activity is
internal. If I needed to do this...

+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" }
+-----+-----------------+------------+
+-----+-----------------+------------+
| MBR | | } === needs UnDelete
+-----+-----------------+------------+

it would be done with two adjacent trays that
slide in. I would need to know the names and
sizes of the drive, so I booted from the
correct one (the un-damaged one) and not
boot from the damaged one. We don't want
writes on the bottom one.

When a file is deleted, its resources can be
reused at any time. We seek to stop writing to the
drive, to protect those resources. If the resources
have not been tampered with, Recuva simply flips
a single byte value in the $MFT and the file is
instantly available again.

If you continue to write to the drive and
don't act quickly enough (use the drive for the
rest of the day), the freed-up clusters from the
files that were deleted, they get overwritten.
Even if you flipped the byte in the $MFT, the
file is corrupt. It is for this reason that
the filenames have the colored dots next to them.
A file with a "red dot", is unfit for recovery.
A file with a "green dot" or all the files having
"green dots", means you stopped usage of the
drive soon enough to keep them green. All it
would take, is writing one giant movie file,
to overwrite all the deleted files and turn
all the dots "red" and nothing could be recovered.

You can flip the byte on a "red" file and make
the file appear again in the listing. But if you
do that, practically none of the original data
is inside it. It contains portions of other files
that have been stored. Thus, if you open the file,
your picture viewer crashes or there are other
anomalies. You have to check the files. If the
files had green dots next to them, testing the
files should take only a short time. If the
files are red, expect trouble, and the testing
is likely to fail (and hopefully, in not too
spectacular a fashion - *don't* run tools with
built-in automated repair capability because
they can make a mess of a file with random bits
of other files in it). To test a file, you want
dumb tools that don't take liberties with the files.

Your data is there, but it is only there until
the clusters get overwritten. Every write operation
on the partition with the problem, risks overwriting
the freed-up resources. That's why there is a rush
to stop using that drive for writes. And the OS
loves to write to the drive. The more modern the
version of Windows, the more it likes to write.
An accidental deletion then, the files will be
unrecoverable in a short time, if the OS is
writing stuff to C: . That's why, if you notice
files are missing several days or a week later,
it's not very likely they're coming back. They'll
all have red dots next to their name. Or, if the
$MFT entries get reused (which happens!), not even
the file names will be locatable by Recuva. I've
watched how the $MFT is used, and it really doesn't
take that long for the filename to disappear either.

The other technique is scavenging. That's when Recuva
doesn't work, the filename is missing or the filename
is there but has a red dot. You can use Photorec and
scan the drive for "fragments of files". But the
output is such a mess, don't waste the time. I tried
once. I got 100,000 chunks of stuff, that when opened
were all corrupted and useless. It's wishful thinking
to think doing more work than the Recuva approach,
is going to pay off. If the file is still mostly intact,
flipping the $MFT byte brings it back. If it's damaged,
there's a good chance it is never coming back.

I've tested undelete, by deleting a JPEG and immediately
doing a scan, and the file was located and had a green dot.
So it can work. But don't be "testing it", until your
recovery project is complete. Then you can be messing
around if you want. You'll only get the one chance to
get these back, so concentrate on that.

Paul


OK, I understand now,.....
I did do a search after reading John's post
and I did find the missing Folder/files

https://postimg.cc/0M83SSP7

I opened the one highlighted to confirm they were there.

If I understand you I'm suppose to remove the HD and put in another
HD then download Recuva then attach my original HD via USB
and scan it that way? Is that correct? Ok,.. here I go I hope I
don't screw this up.

Thanks,
Robert

On Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at 5:33:27 PM UTC-7, Paul wrote:

I changed HD's on the 8500 and now in Windows Boot Manager it says

Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. To fix the problem:

1. insert your Windows installation disc and restart your computer.
2. choose your language settings, and then click 'next'
3. click 'repair your computer'.

If you do not have this disc, contact your system administator or computer manufacturer for assistance.

Status 0xc000000e

Info: The boot selection failed because a required device is inaccessible.

Great, now the problem is worst than before! I knew something this would happen.
I never liked opening up the computers. I'm going to switch back the hard drives.
I sure hope I haven't lost the 8500 because of this!!

Robert

I'm back on the 8500, that was a little scary
I was wondering if I would get the 8500
back! Whew!

Here's what I was looking at:

https://postimg.cc/Cd9M2Cfk

I think it was a bad HD. I checked and I have
(2) HD's for the 780 with Win 10 and (1) HD
for the 8500 with Win 10 but I thought we made
more than one HD for the 8500 with Win 7 Pro?

So it means I have to buy some HD's and we have
to make up at least (2) for the 8500 and (1) for the
780 although I may of just mislabeled them. I would
have to put each one in to check for sure but in any case
more Win 7 Pro OS is called for and I still need to buy
a APC surge protector.

btw how do I use CcCleaner? I seem to remember you
can really screw things up with it. Are there allot of checdk
boxes etc?

So at this point, I would rather have an operational 8500
and I can just rebuild the lost folder/files from the bookmarks
I found but there's a couple of other things that have happened.
My mouse seems over sensitive when I click it and I haven't
messed with any of the settings and I've noticed recently
that my backspace key doesn't function. It's weird how they
changed by themselves.

Thanks,
Robert

btw, I realize I could use my Win 10 HD to do this but it seems
allot of effort just to recover bookmarks. Is there something else
were looking for?

I just would hate to loose my Win 7 on the 8500 because I depend
on it allot and I don't particularly like opening it up to change HD's
because with my past history it can create more problems.

Robert
Robert

Robert in CA wrote:
I'm back on the 8500, that was a little scary
I was wondering if I would get the 8500
back! Whew!

Here's what I was looking at:

https://postimg.cc/Cd9M2Cfk

I think it was a bad HD. I checked and I have
(2) HD's for the 780 with Win 10 and (1) HD
for the 8500 with Win 10 but I thought we made
more than one HD for the 8500 with Win 7 Pro?

So it means I have to buy some HD's and we have
to make up at least (2) for the 8500 and (1) for the
780 although I may of just mislabeled them. I would
have to put each one in to check for sure but in any case
more Win 7 Pro OS is called for and I still need to buy
a APC surge protector.

btw how do I use CcCleaner? I seem to remember you
can really screw things up with it. Are there allot of checdk
boxes etc?

So at this point, I would rather have an operational 8500
and I can just rebuild the lost folder/files from the bookmarks
I found but there's a couple of other things that have happened.
My mouse seems over sensitive when I click it and I haven't
messed with any of the settings and I've noticed recently
that my backspace key doesn't function. It's weird how they
changed by themselves.

Thanks,
Robert

There's probably nothing wrong with the hard drive, particularly.

Carefully maintain your labeling, so cloned drives are
being plugged into the correct machine.

Your favorite model of new hard drive, may have been supplanted
by a more crappy version. The three platter one you were
using, seemed to be nice. But that may have been
replaced by a two platter one, and some of those are
a bit slower and jerky when loaded up with Windows.

We know you don't like the WDC Black, because they're a bit noisy.

And they keep messing around with the models anyway, and
you have to be careful to not pick something that's taken
a turn for the worse.

*******

Using the Macrium boot CD, you can select "boot repair" while
*only* the defective 8500 drive in in the 8500 tray. And no
other drives, not even connected via USB. Just the one drive.
One of the menus has a "Boot Repair" item, and this will
locate trivially lost items and bolt them back together.

If C: on the emergency 8500 drive had been absolutely
destroyed (which could happen), then Macrium Boot Repair
will not help. The hard drive will remain unbootable
if the C: was trashed.

Using your collection of backup images, your knowledge
of which ones aren't infected, you can put back
a good copy of C: over top. But this generally requires
two drives (one USB connected), so that you have a source
..mrimg file to use to restore the C: that needs repairing.

*******

With regard to what happened to your bookmarks, either
you have the correct collection of bookmarks, or you don't.
You have to decide, whether your recovery was successful
and "the fire is out". I can't tell from here, whether
any more forensic effort is required or not. You make it
sound like this is a misplacement issue (drag and drop with
a sticky mouse button will do that). In which case, you'd
make sure your mouse was fully functional, so it doesn't
happen a second time. I had to open up my Logitech mouse
and do some cleaning up near the buttons on the casing,
to restore decent drag (without dropping). I've on occasion,
dropped a folder in some obscure spot, and yes, Agent Ransack
search finds it for me :-)

As long as you haven't deleted the files or the folder, then
we don't really need to be using Recuva. It's only if
Agent Ransack can't find the correct version, that
tools like Recuva (and the correct discipline while
using the tool) are required.

Try to keep track of your most important materials. If
C: became infected, you can restore it from backup. But if
you overwrote C: with a really old image, then your
bookmarks would take significant damage. You should
keep some sort of Exported copy of Bookmarks.html for
days like that. It should be stored separately somewhere,
and while your regular backups will capture a copy of
the bookmarks, to not lose daily bookmark changes, you'd
need a daily copy of them.

If you absolutely rely on browser-stored password management,
then the browser profile folder could be captured as a backup
item as well. An Agent Ransack search on C: for "Profiles",
will find all sorts of important profiles. Here, I've located
the one for the browser I use, Seamonkey.

C:\... \Mozilla\SeaMonkey\Profiles\1234abcd.default
--------

The Profiles folder for the various software products, has
things like key3.db or key4.db and some other file similar to
that, and that's where persistent password storage is located.
Capturing the named folder, the "1234abcd.default" style folder,
will capture individual files like key4.db . The easily infectable
prefs.js is in there too (the one the adwares like to attack).

To make sure you have the correct Profiles item, you'd
want to make sure there was a key4.db type file in it,
as that indicates it's the correct folder for the job.
That 1234abcd.default folder also has "bookmarkbackups",
which is the browser version of bookmarks. Doing an
Export of Bookmarks, reads the current file from that
collection, and delivers it as an HTML file. The HTML file
is "the one humans use". It's a wee bit more portable.

Paul

I have to really concentrate when I read your stuff *L*

First,.. I have started to rebuild my Shopping folder/files
and part of the reason was the point you hit on. My link
to buying HD's. This is the one we've been using.

https://www.newegg.com/seagate-deskt...2E16822148834#

I have one Star Tech case left:

https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227

It says they are out of stock can you suggest another case?

What happens with the mouse is that for example, if I'm in my Dell imaging
where I usually have 2 screens displayed. Lets say I open a third to do some
work but when I close it the mouse closes one of the 2 screens that were open.
It didn't use to do that. So I have to set the screens up all over like I had them.

That's what happened with the bookmarks it just kept going and did whatever it
did.

In a way I'm glad this happened because I realized I have zero HD backups for
Windows 7 Pro for either computer. I think what happened was that we did have
the Win7 Pro OS but we took advantage of the Windows 10 option. Thats why all
the HD's were Win 10. So here's the plan; around the end of April I get paid again
and will buy (4) HD's so we can create Win 7 Pro OS for both the 8500 and 780 and
we can pick up again then.

I checked and I do have rescue disks etc that we made before so I'm sure I have
something there. You made sure I did everything correct.

Oh btw what do you think of me using brushes or compressed air to clean the inside
of the computer out?

Thoughts/suggestions?
Robert

btw I have a logitech m310 mouse and cleaned the lens with
some Windex on a q-tip. It seems to have made a difference.

Thanks,
Robert

Robert in CA wrote:
btw I have a logitech m310 mouse and cleaned the lens with
some Windex on a q-tip. It seems to have made a difference.

Thanks,
Robert

Yes, test with a working mouse and see if the
symptoms of mis-behavior go away.

That would tend to support either a cleaning
issue with the defective mouse, or an electrical
issue. And if the mouse cable has an open in it,
you'd probably have a wider variety of symptoms.

The optical part of modern mice is pretty good,
when it comes to dust preventing the lens from
working. The sensor is more of an array than
a single sensor. Don't let the grotty appearance
of the plastics they use for those, deceive.
I know some people, assume the appearance is
a defect, and scrub them, but they don't really
need to be scrubbed particularly. Whoever makes
the sensor assemblies for those, just doesn't
care what the mold plastic looks like :-) Only
if some sort of foreign matter (like the mouse
fell into a bowl of chili), would it need the
real cleaning treatment. But dust does pack
in other places, especially around where the
mouse button cover plastic on top, meets the
microswitch. You can get enough dust impacted,
to prevent the microswitch from depressing.

When you disassemble a mouse for cleaning, be
careful around the scroll wheel. Some scroll
wheels have a tiny bit of a clear gel grease
on them. And you would not want to remove
stuff like that. There are all sorts of
fiddly springs on those scroll wheels. When
you tilt up the hinged cover, do the tilting
in the upright position, so the scroll wheel
doesn't fall out of its mount, onto the desk.
And all those blasted small parts with it.
I learned my lesson when I took my Logitech
apart - what I can't believe, is they design
them with that many parts inside. It must take
a ton of human assemblers to be putting those
together.

Paul

Robert in CA wrote:
I have to really concentrate when I read your stuff *L*

First,.. I have started to rebuild my Shopping folder/files
and part of the reason was the point you hit on. My link
to buying HD's. This is the one we've been using.

https://www.newegg.com/seagate-deskt...2E16822148834#

I have one Star Tech case left:

https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227

It says they are out of stock can you suggest another case?

What happens with the mouse is that for example, if I'm in my Dell imaging
where I usually have 2 screens displayed. Lets say I open a third to do some
work but when I close it the mouse closes one of the 2 screens that were open.
It didn't use to do that. So I have to set the screens up all over like I had them.

That's what happened with the bookmarks it just kept going and did whatever it
did.

In a way I'm glad this happened because I realized I have zero HD backups for
Windows 7 Pro for either computer. I think what happened was that we did have
the Win7 Pro OS but we took advantage of the Windows 10 option. Thats why all
the HD's were Win 10. So here's the plan; around the end of April I get paid again
and will buy (4) HD's so we can create Win 7 Pro OS for both the 8500 and 780 and
we can pick up again then.

I checked and I do have rescue disks etc that we made before so I'm sure I have
something there. You made sure I did everything correct.

Oh btw what do you think of me using brushes or compressed air to clean the inside
of the computer out?

Thoughts/suggestions?
Robert




The Startech seems to have moved to putting fans, only
on their multi-bay enclosures. And those are too expensive
for a little occasional usage with a single drive.

There is the Rosewill one. This has a fan on it.

https://www.newegg.com/rosewill-rx30...82E16817182316

But it's so hard to tell how the drive installs in there,
and you know how important that is when they get it wrong.

https://www.rosewill.com/product/ros...display-panel/

There is a 55MB user manual with pictures. Their
download page is a bit slow, so this will take a bit of time.

https://www.rosewill.com/download/us...dl=37249&ind=0

( from https://www.rosewill.com/download/us...u3-35b-ol-pdf/ )

There aren't going to be as many options with fans.
They like to make enclosures without fans, to
try to cook the drives.

*******

A lot of cleaning methods, to remove dust from computers,
generate static electricity. And that isn't always the
best for the equipment. If you use the duster-in-a-can,
that's a refrigerant, and can drop the temperature of the
chips you point it at, quite drastically. They don't
have windowed DIP EPROMS in computers any more, but when
they did, the low temperature materials in spray cans
could kill those. That's the only component I know of,
that could be killed by sudden temperature shock.

A less-concentrated airflow, like maybe a reversed vacuum
cleaner, used outdoors on a table, might be a way to
dislodge the dust. Some vacuum cleaners, had fittings
so you could reverse the flow for blower applications.

Using a vacuum in vacuum mode, isn't recommended. Static
discharge can come off the barrel of the metal tube. It's
the movement of dust particulate, over the black plastic surfaces
of the ICs, that can generate static, and that is static
right next to the electrical pins on them. But some static
can also be generated on vacuum hoses or tubing, and if the
vacuum metal tube touches something, there could be a discharge.

It's really hard to give iron-clad guarantees about this
topic. If the anti-static police at work were here,
they'd be constantly rapping me on the knuckles,
for "bad technique". We had some guys, entrusted with
that role. Anti-static police.

Paul

I read all your info,. and bookmarked the cases and the 55mb file
thanks *s*

btw I liked your comment,... if the mouse fell into a bowl of chili *L*

I was a bit premature with the mouse and my backspace key
still doesn't function. I didn't spill anything etc to cause this it
just stopped functioning like the mouse is too sensitive when I
open/close things it keeps on going and closes or opens more
than I want. Like the Dell Imaging example I gave you.

So how do I restore my backspace key and mouse so they are
back to 'normal'? hmm I have to check and see if I have a spare
mouse or maybe I should just buy a new one?

What do you think about restoring the 8500 with the last Mrimg?
wouldn't that restore all the bookmarks and maybe fix the mouse
and backspace problem or maybe do a system restore? Although
I'm a bit iffy of doing so until I have a backup Win 7 Pro created.

Ok, this just happened,.....

How weird, the 8500 just started up like it was a fan going and then
died down again! and now alls quiet! I have never heard it do that!
Whats going on ? That was very weird!!!

p.s. while were talking about mice, I haven't seen any since you gave
me the great advice 8 months ago?


Thoughts/suggestions?
Robert