Problem with Users folder

It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim

On 05/02/2017 03:27 PM, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim


Hi Jim,

First, turn off hidden folders:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=windows+10...&t=ffab&ia=web

Then download TreeSize Free or similar and run:

http://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/
http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

It will tell you where the log jam is.

Also, I presume your 117 GB drive is an SSD? It is too
small for what you are doing. Consider upgrading to a
500GB SSD. (I like Samsung. NVMe is 5 times faster than SATA.)

HTH,
-T

On 02/05/2017 23:56, T wrote:
On 05/02/2017 03:27 PM, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim


Hi Jim,

First, turn off hidden folders:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=windows+10...&t=ffab&ia=web

Then download TreeSize Free or similar and run:

http://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/
http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

It will tell you where the log jam is.

Also, I presume your 117 GB drive is an SSD? It is too
small for what you are doing. Consider upgrading to a
500GB SSD. (I like Samsung. NVMe is 5 times faster than SATA.)

HTH,
-T



Thanks for that, T. I have deleted all those files, which has returned
about half of Drive C: to me.

The computer is a HP Pavilion 550-103na, and came with three resident
drives:
C:\ Windows 117GB (62GB free)
D:\ DATADRIVE1 1.81TB (1.59TB free)
Z:\ SYSTEM 356MB (278MG free)
It is still under warranty, so I need to be careful what I do to it.

C:\ & Z:\ are on the same physical drive, along with a hidden 980MB
Recovery Partition. It's a damned nuisance, but D:\ appears to be a
separate drive, so I don't think I can enlarge the C:\ partition. I say
"appears" because C:\, Z:\ & Recovery are listed under Disk 0 (119.12GB)
in Disk Management. D:\ is under Disk 1 (1862.89GB). Together, those two
physical drives add up to 1982GB, which makes me wonder if they are in
fact parts of the same 2TB physical drive.

I'm not worried about the data currently on the D:\ drive, so if they
are the same physical drive, is there any way of confirming that and
then repartitioning it to transfer, say, 1TB of D:\ across to C:\
without affecting anything on C:\? I don't really need that much space
on D:\ because I already have two external USB drives (1TB & 3TB)
connected for bulk data storage, and only use D:\ as a faster access
drive for work I am doing.

Oh, and an afterthought. I have now found out the culprit is Switch
Sound File Converter, which creates two files, 1 original and 1
converted, in that folder every time I convert a file. And there is no
facility within the program to delete temporary files on exit. Strange,
but those files are either not created or are deleted on a Win7 machine,
because there is no sign of them on that one.

jim

In article , , jbm says...

It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

The question would be then, what program did you use to do this work?
It would surely be the culprit.
Perhaps it has settings with regards its temp files?

--
Duncan.

On 5/2/2017 7:24 PM, Wolf K wrote:
On 2017-05-02 18:27, jbm wrote:
[snip tale of woe about ntemp files]
What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim

In my experience, very few programs do any housekeeping. Windows is no
better. You have to clean up the temp files yourself. Browsers can be
set to

a) use Windows Disk Cleanup;
or
b) use CCleaner or similar 3rd party cleanup utility;
that will get rid of most of the clutter. Make sure you examine the
options before you run these programs.
And
c) follow T's instructions to find locations of outdated files.

Good luck.

If you have had problems with updates failing, you may also gain space
by deleting the files in C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution.

First check to insure there are no pending updates in All Settings,
Updates & Security, Windows Update, Check for Updates.

Once all of the updates are install, you can delete all files in
C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution. (You may not get all of the files in
DataStore, but the system will correct any problem transparently ) If
your are experiencing update problems, they may be corrected by deleting
these files.

This can free up a lot of space. I have literally had to delete
thousands of files when problems occurred in Windows Updates.

--
2017: The year we lean to play the great game of Euchre

On 02/05/2017 23:27, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last
night I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was
running low. The computer has only be running since the middle of
March, so I immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up
117GB that quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the
problem in my own personal user folder in
C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my name.)

You can delete everything in a Temp folder so do it now. There are some
files you may not be able to delete immediately but make a habit of
deleting everything in a temp folder once a month.



This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Unhide it by launching the File Explorer and then do as shown in this
pictu

http://i.imgur.com/jToVLak.png http://i.imgur.com/jToVLak.png









--
With over 500 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.

On 05/02/2017 05:00 PM, jbm wrote:
On 02/05/2017 23:56, T wrote:
On 05/02/2017 03:27 PM, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim


Hi Jim,

First, turn off hidden folders:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=windows+10...&t=ffab&ia=web

Then download TreeSize Free or similar and run:

http://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/
http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

It will tell you where the log jam is.

Also, I presume your 117 GB drive is an SSD? It is too
small for what you are doing. Consider upgrading to a
500GB SSD. (I like Samsung. NVMe is 5 times faster than SATA.)

HTH,
-T



Thanks for that, T. I have deleted all those files, which has returned
about half of Drive C: to me.

The computer is a HP Pavilion 550-103na, and came with three resident
drives:
C:\ Windows 117GB (62GB free)
D:\ DATADRIVE1 1.81TB (1.59TB free)
Z:\ SYSTEM 356MB (278MG free)
It is still under warranty, so I need to be careful what I do to it.

C:\ & Z:\ are on the same physical drive, along with a hidden 980MB
Recovery Partition. It's a damned nuisance, but D:\ appears to be a
separate drive, so I don't think I can enlarge the C:\ partition. I say
"appears" because C:\, Z:\ & Recovery are listed under Disk 0 (119.12GB)
in Disk Management. D:\ is under Disk 1 (1862.89GB). Together, those two
physical drives add up to 1982GB, which makes me wonder if they are in
fact parts of the same 2TB physical drive.

I'm not worried about the data currently on the D:\ drive, so if they
are the same physical drive, is there any way of confirming that and
then repartitioning it to transfer, say, 1TB of D:\ across to C:\
without affecting anything on C:\? I don't really need that much space
on D:\ because I already have two external USB drives (1TB & 3TB)
connected for bulk data storage, and only use D:\ as a faster access
drive for work I am doing.

Oh, and an afterthought. I have now found out the culprit is Switch
Sound File Converter, which creates two files, 1 original and 1
converted, in that folder every time I convert a file. And there is no
facility within the program to delete temporary files on exit. Strange,
but those files are either not created or are deleted on a Win7 machine,
because there is no sign of them on that one.

jim


You are most welcome

On Wed, 3 May 2017 01:00:07 +0100, jbm wrote:

On 02/05/2017 23:56, T wrote:
On 05/02/2017 03:27 PM, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim


Hi Jim,

First, turn off hidden folders:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=windows+10...&t=ffab&ia=web

Then download TreeSize Free or similar and run:

http://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/
http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

It will tell you where the log jam is.

Also, I presume your 117 GB drive is an SSD? It is too
small for what you are doing. Consider upgrading to a
500GB SSD. (I like Samsung. NVMe is 5 times faster than SATA.)

HTH,
-T



Thanks for that, T. I have deleted all those files, which has returned
about half of Drive C: to me.

The computer is a HP Pavilion 550-103na, and came with three resident
drives:
C:\ Windows 117GB (62GB free)
D:\ DATADRIVE1 1.81TB (1.59TB free)
Z:\ SYSTEM 356MB (278MG free)
It is still under warranty, so I need to be careful what I do to it.

C:\ & Z:\ are on the same physical drive, along with a hidden 980MB
Recovery Partition. It's a damned nuisance, but D:\ appears to be a
separate drive, so I don't think I can enlarge the C:\ partition. I say
"appears" because C:\, Z:\ & Recovery are listed under Disk 0 (119.12GB)
in Disk Management. D:\ is under Disk 1 (1862.89GB). Together, those two
physical drives add up to 1982GB, which makes me wonder if they are in
fact parts of the same 2TB physical drive.

Three things:

1. In Disk management, Drive 0 and Drive 1 are two separate physical
drives. Drive 2 would be a third physical drive, and so on.

2. When a 2TB drive is formatted, the usable space is approximately
1862GB, so what you see for D: looks correct. That drive appears to be a
2TB physical drive.

3. Your Drive 0 (C:, Z:, and unlettered Recovery) appears to be a 120GB
SSD. IMHO, that's way too small, but if you're careful you can work with
it. To me, the system drive should be at least 500GB.

jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim


Piriform CCleaner would make a worthy assistant.
Just avoid any registry cleaning.

When I ran CleanMgr.exe on Win10, it said I had
62MB of files, but neither %temp% or C:\Windows\temp
had that kind of file content. My conclusion there is,
something is wrong with where it's cleaning.

The original concept of "temp", was a folder that
was volatile - it could not be guaranteed to be present
after a reboot. And thus, users should not leave files
in there. Particularly, if there is a power failure as
when the machine boots up the "temp" could be empty.
I don't think Windows today is quite that aggressive.

I can't say I've ever seen a %temp% at the 100GB level...

*******

I used Process Monitor, to watch what cleanmgr.exe is working
on. This is a summary of some stuff it touched. The things I
filtered on to get the list included:

Process is CleanMgr.exe
Operation is SetDispositionInformationFile
(all of these happened to be "Delete: True")

That's the event type that seems to correspond to housecleaning.

C:\Users\User Name\AppData\Local\Temp
C:\Windows\Temp\
C:\Windows\Logs\dosvc\dosvc.20170315_114743_343.et l --- Windows Update???
C:\Windows\Logs\NetSetup\service.0.etl
C:\Windows\Logs\WindowsUpdate\
C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\WMI\FaceRecoTel.etl.0 01 --- Face Recognition Telemetry? No webcam
C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\
C:\Users\User Name\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.Cort ana_cw5n1h2txyewy\AC\Temp\StructuredQuery.log
C:\Users\User Name\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.Cort ana_cw5n1h2txyewy\TempState\Traces\CortanaTrace1.e tl
C:\Users\User Name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\Thum bCacheToDelete

It's what it *didn't* delete which was interesting.

I placed a file in %temp% and a file in C:\Windows\Temp manually,
and neither file was deleted by CleanMgr.exe. Only the files
left behind by programs got cleaned. It could be, that
whatever file ownership or permissions, on the gigabyte files
in question on your machine, match the failure cases on mine.
My test files were 1GB and 2GB in size, to make it easy to
spot them in the CleanMgr listing before deletion. The files
were not included in any size calculation. And neither were
the files deleted. They're still present.

The files did not have an open handle on them. They were
created on one drive, and copied into the two temp folders.
And Cleanmgr.exe would not remove them.

Paul

On 02/05/2017 23:27, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last
night I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was
running low. The computer has only be running since the middle of
March, so I immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up
117GB that quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the
problem in my own personal user folder in
C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my name.) This particular
folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare
a large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud
drive. These files are imported from a network drive into the
(DATADRIVE1) Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and
the metadata completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise
and play them correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac
files totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB
drive. If these files are just a temporary holding block while I am
working on them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename
Utility, mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter),
these files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not
find or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this
folder every time to delete these files. How can it be done
automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim



One thing you need to do is to setup your machine (called Storage Sense)
so that Windows can periodically delete useless files that you don't
need. The setting is as shown in this pictu

http://i.imgur.com/wnfe26y.png http://i.imgur.com/wnfe26y.png



--
With over 500 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.

jbm wrote:

Last night I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive
was running low. Extensive searches through that drive found the
problem in my own personal user folder in
C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my name.) This
particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

It shouldn't be hidden from you. Input %temp% (use the environment
variable) in an address bar (taskbar address bar, Windows Explorer
address bar) to see what's in there.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac
files totalling 58GB.

Consider reconfiguring your program(s) to use a temp folder on a
different drive than your SSD, like over on an HDD. SSDs can sustain
only so many write operations and all that temporary work is shortening
the life and reliability of your SSD. What you are doing does not
require extreme speed to accomplish.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not
find or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into
this folder every time to delete these files. How can it be done
automatically.

Files that are still inuse cannot be deleted (without extra help).
Normal delete tools will not touch inuse files; else, they might **** up
whatever process has an open handle on the file(s). Make sure when you
exit the program(s) that they have actually exited. Just because a GUI
window disappears does not mandate the program has unloaded and freed
all inuse files. If the program is rude in not cleaning up after itself
(and you cannot find or afford a replacement and better mannered
program) then run the program from a batch (.bat) file. In the batch
file, load the program. In the line after loading the program, have a
command to delete the %temp% files, or just the ones there the program
created (since deleting temp files from other programs may screw up
those other programs).

I use CCleaner to include cleaning out the %temp% folder. Rather than
run it manually, I added a scheduled event in Task Scheduler to run
CCleaner. To eliminate showing its GUI and having to do the job
manually, add the /auto command-line switch, as in:

path\ccleaner.exe /auto

You can even create a shortcut to run that command line. In your batch
file, you could run CCleaner after the program exits. It will cleanup
according to how you configured it. I've even added other folders that
some apps create that I do not want lingering around. Too many think
they can just go ahead and pollute the My Documents folder with their
own subfolder. If you use their program then, gee, you must surely want
them leaving behind files or empty folders after exit.

CCleaner has an option to delete files that are "older than 24 hours".
That is because, for example, some installations have to replace inuse
files and will do a reboot to do that. They may put some files, like
another installer, to complete the installation after the reboot into
the %temp% folder. You might also do an oops and need back a file that
was in the %temp% folder that you just deleted (and was too big to go
into the Recycle Bin). With Task Scheduler, you can even have it wait
until the computer has been idle for N minutes before it runs the
CCleaner job.

On Wed, 3 May 2017 01:00:07 +0100, jbm wrote:

The computer is a HP Pavilion 550-103na, and came with three resident
drives:
C:\ Windows 117GB (62GB free)
D:\ DATADRIVE1 1.81TB (1.59TB free)
Z:\ SYSTEM 356MB (278MG free)
It is still under warranty, so I need to be careful what I do to it.

C:\ & Z:\ are on the same physical drive, along with a hidden 980MB
Recovery Partition. It's a damned nuisance, but D:\ appears to be a
separate drive, so I don't think I can enlarge the C:\ partition. I say
"appears" because C:\, Z:\ & Recovery are listed under Disk 0 (119.12GB)
in Disk Management. D:\ is under Disk 1 (1862.89GB). Together, those two
physical drives add up to 1982GB, which makes me wonder if they are in
fact parts of the same 2TB physical drive.

You are correct.
C: and Z: are a 128 GB SSD.
D: is a 2 TB mechanical hard drive.

jim

On Wed, 3 May 2017 01:50:54 +0100, Good Guy
wrote:

You can delete everything in a Temp folder so do it now. There are some
files you may not be able to delete immediately but make a habit of
deleting everything in a temp folder once a month.

Would a batch file be useful here?

Wolf K wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:

jbm wrote:

C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my name.) This
particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

It shouldn't be hidden from you. Input %temp% (use the environment
variable) in an address bar (taskbar address bar, Windows Explorer
address bar) to see what's in there.

/AppData is hidden, from Win7 on.

Been a very long time since I altered the defaults of Windows/File
Explorer so it *does* show hidden files. Tis probably one of several
settings that get changed the first time I open Windows/File Explorer
after a fresh install of Windows. I forgot the default might be
otherwise.

If you know the target path, Explorer will go there even if a folder has
the hidden attribute. Enter C:\Users in its address bar. Start
appending your profile (Windows account) name and the address bar
pre-populates with your profile name after a few matching characters.
Same for appending appdata to select that folder. While this is doable,
it's easier and faster to just enter %temp% into an address bar.

On 02/05/2017 23:27, jbm wrote:
It took me while to find where the problem lay with this one. Last night
I got a nasty message telling me that space on the C Drive was running
low. The computer has only be running since the middle of March, so I
immediately smelt a rat, and I shouldn't have filled up 117GB that
quick. Extensive searches through that drive found the problem in my own
personal user folder in C:\Users\Xxxxx\AppData\Local\Temp. (Xxxxx is my
name.) This particular folder was hidden which didn't help matters.

Up till now, about the only work this computer has done is to prepare a
large number of audio and video files for transfer to a MyCloud drive.
These files are imported from a network drive into the (DATADRIVE1)
Drive D:\ within Windows 10, where they are renamed and the metadata
completed so the hi-fi and TV downstairs can recognise and play them
correctly across the home network.

What I have just found in the Users folder are 396 .wav and .flac files
totalling 58GB. No wonder I am running out of room on a 117GB drive. If
these files are just a temporary holding block while I am working on
them, when I close the applications that I use (Bulk Rename Utility,
mp3tag, Audio Editor Deluxe and Switch Sound File Converter), these
files should surely be deleted.

What is going on? Is there some switch that needs to be activated to
delete these files on exit? I have run "Disc Cleanup" which did not find
or remove them. I don't really want the hassle of going into this folder
every time to delete these files. How can it be done automatically.

Thanks in anticipation

jim



Right. First off, a big thank you to all who imparted their knowledge in
answer to my original questions. I am really grateful.

Secondly, I am a bit ****ed off with HP for installing such a small
drive as their main C:\ drive. Especially since it is obviously not
possible to increase the partition size without replacing the whole
drive. Which would then cause even more problems because the recovery
partition is on the same drive, and I do not have Win10 installation
discs. My old Win7 machine, also an HP, was built with a 600GB primary
drive, which after almost 8 years still only has about 150BG in use, and
has never undergone a deep spring clean since the day it was born.

Thirdly, I have always been a bit wary of using automatic clean-up
applications, mainly because I feel they may start "hoovering under the
carpet" and remove something important that I had forgotten about.
Anyway, after some degree of deep thought, and thanks to a new feature
within Win10, which wasn't in Win7, I have found a satisfactory solution
to the whole problem. I have placed a short cut to the Temp folder in
the Quick Access section of File Manager, so just one click puts me in
there, and I can delete what I want manually. At least the Quick Access
does away with scrolling through a multitude of folders to get to the
one I want.

Fourthly, the trouble I had finding the cause of the disc usage was
partly my fault. Like VanguardLH, I always used to change the hidden
files feature in File Manager to show everything. And like him, it is so
long since I had to do that I had forgotten all about it. When I looked
at the properties of the Users folders from the folder tree, it showed
60GB in use. Because the AppData file was hidden, checking the
properties from the file side of Manager, it showed just 300MB in use.
One hell of a difference, which took a lot of head scratching to
explain. Once AppData was visible, the two figures were the virtually
the same.

I still find it rather strange that using the same program (Switch) with
the same files on the Win7 machine does not cause this problem. I had a
quick look around earlier, and can not find one instance of any wav or
FLAC files resident on the old computer where they shouldn't be.

Thanks one and all

jim