Augeas
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Posts posted by Augeas
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Augeas,
I closed all programs and windows, deleted all the files in the prefetch folder, restarted my computer and then forced Windows to rebuild ""Layout.ini"" again. The result was that that file was only 19 kB in size.
Ah Willy, what a difference a few words make!
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I'm on XPHSP3. I don't usually have anuything in the Exclude section but...
I right clicked on Cleaner/Recent Documents, and selected Analyze. It showed three blah.blah.lnk files.
I went to Options/Exclude/Add, and clicked Browse on Drive or Folder, navigated to My Recent Documents, and pressed OK. I then clicked File Types at the bottom of the small pane, and entered *.lnk and clicked OK. I then went back to Cleaner, right clicked Recent Documents, and selected Anaylze. All three .lnk files were excluded from the analysis.
I then removed the Exclude entry and tested the same thing but with Add File instead of Drive or Folder. This did not exclude anything. So I suggest that you try method number one.
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I believe that the Custom Files and Folders applies to Includes only. Excludes are excluded whether this box is ticked or not.
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I did that Willy, and the contents (I can't recall the actual file sizes) were exactly the same as before. I believe that Windows builds Layout.ini from the existing prefetch files, so I would expect the contents to remain the same.
I do notice that if I delete a few prefetch files then Layout.ini shrinks in size quite quickly, so it is being dynamically managed by good old Windows.
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Whilst I agree that it would be a good idea to clean the prefetch folder now and again (to get rid of dross and reduce prefetch defrag time), Windows does not use this folder to determine what is being loaded either at boot or any other time, so it can't reintroduce malware or any other baddie. As Aethec says, it's just a list.
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If you look at Layout.ini using Wordpad you will see that it lists many user data files associated with the applications in the prefetch folder. They will usually be harmless, but there could be thingsIshouldnotlookat.jpg. Layout.ini, and the .pf files it is created from, can hold names of files long since deleted. It's no great problem, but somebody will worry about it.
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Thanks for that MM. I didn't say that data recovery specialists couldn't recover your data, they could probably make some progress at least given time and money. They have the software and experience. There is probably some free software around like Winhex that could list all your clusters, all you have to do then is piece them together. But 200 gb is 50,000,000 4k clusters to sort out, so you can see the enormity of the job.
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Peter, just having the Delete old prefetch data box ticked is sufficient to delete old stuff. CC won't delete any entries until they are 14 days (or is it 10?) old, so on an active pc using a wide set of applications you might not see any deletions at all. If your prefetch folder has reached the limit then Windows will knock off the oldest unused entries for you.
I use a small set of applications, so my prefetch folder never approaches the Windows max of around 127 (can't remember the actual figure). Some prefetch files would never be cleared from my folder, so I have this option ticked. I know it's a piffling thing, but I do it, and I have about 35-40 prefetch entries at amy time.
Having unused stuff in the prefetch folder is quite revealing. They often contain a list of accessed data files, and this list gets amalgamated into Layout.ini (which can be huge, and is a quite interesting read!). Not only does Windows use this list to run a mini-defrag of all these files every few days, which I could quite easily live without, but every man and his dog can see what you've been up to.
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Try... In the Filename or Path box select Pictures. Then tick the box next to Filename top l/h corner. Then right click, select Recover Checked. Recover them into whatever folder you select.
You ca of course sort Recuva's results by Last Modified date by clicking on the column header. After you have recovered your files you can show the folder in Details view, and also show the Date Created and Date Modified fields (which are maintained in recovery) and sort these columns too.
Your other requirements are beyond me, and I suspect beyond most software too.
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There are several things here. I would think that the defragging has very likely overwritten part, or parts, of the 200 gb file, making it unrecoverable, or rather recoverable but useless (even if you could find it). Defragging is a killer for recovering deleted files.
I'm surprised that a deep scan only returns 53 files. I would expect more like 53,000, but we don't know what else was in that partition or how it has been used. I wonder if the combination of defrag and huge files (and what else is on the disk) has caused that. Maybe there's only ever been 50-odd files on that partition. As far as I know a deep scan identifies files by reading the info at the start of the cluster. It only needs the first cluster to be overwritten to make the rest of the 200 gb file unidentifiable.
Zero-length files are quite common. It is not weird that they aren't overwritten as they have no clusters allocated to be overwritten.
Your chances of recovery? Not good, I would say. I don't think that there's anything else you can do with Recuva.
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Depends what you mean, really. As far as I know your ISP has a record of every search you made and every site you visited, and has by law to keep these records for at least 12 months (UK). Changing your IP address, as will happen with dynamic IP addressing every time you boot your pc/router, is no defence, as your ISP will be able to cross-reference dynamic allocations to a particular user.
Websites will also record who's visited, and again any visit can be traced back to some hapless user. There are some who use proxy sites to hide this info from the visited site, but the ISP will still have the original request. People have dedicated their lives to evading detection, there must be acres of stuff on Google (but your ISP will know you're looking for it!).
I'm sure our wonderful government is also monitoring certain sites as we speak, or type, as well as analysing every email that's sent.
PS Here, by co-incidence, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8633642.stm
Have a look at the Gov Requests Tool on the right. I bet that going by % of population the UK makes the most data requests in the world.
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Same on SSDs, why would it be different there?
Because (as far as I know) the concept of reserving an area of disk is inapplicable on SSDs due to the wear-levelling process, as is defragmentation. On SSDs wear-levelling inherently causes fragmentation, fragmentation is good for reads, and defragging is bad.
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Indeed that is good, but what puzzles me is this from Microsoft's Windows 7 pages:
'System Restore affects Windows system files, programs, and registry settings. It can also make changes to scripts, batch files, and other types of executable files created under any user account on your computer. System Restore does not affect personal files, such as e-mail, documents, or photos, so it cannot help you restore a deleted file. If you have backups of your files, you can restore the files from a backup.'
My italics, as they say. I haven't dug too deeply as I am not on Win 7, and I have never run a system restore on my current install.
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It would take a month of Sundays to run, it would be difficult if not impossible for an application to extract the yes/no info from other sites, the layout of these sites can change without notice, much of the yes/no info depends on where the process is run from, many of the processes depend on the user pc configuration, many depend on the user's own whims, much of the yes/no info is opinion, much of it is never upsdated, and depending on a 'foreign' website that can disappear overnight is bad. So I guess that's a no from me..
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Yes, what you say makes sense. I should perhaps have said try running Recuva before trying sys restore. I don't know much about Win 7 sys restore: I don't think it backs up all changed user data, don't you have to spec what user data is to be backed up?
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Not that this is particularly on topic, but you already have that facility. Type *.doc or .doc (or whatever extension you are looking for) in the Filename/Path box and as if by magic your wish will be granted.
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I would disagree, Ishi. A sys restore will copy many older files back to disk, overwriting much of the space which might hold the OP's deleted files. Sys restore does not particularly archive, and restore, data files, especially in XP. The best plan as I see it is to preserve the disk and use a deleted file resorer, such as Recuva or as you say Undelete (of which I have no knowledge).
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Try running Piriform's Recuva. If possible use your pc as little as possible, download and run Recuva to/from a Flash drive, and recover any found files to the flash drive as well.
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I think the answer is in the last four posts in this (old) thread, Cartel.
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Although on a co.uk site that appears to be an article applying to the USA. I just think that private copying is unclear in the UK, but no doubt the EUCD will be draconian when it's implemented.
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Stupid mistake. I meant copy copy-protected DVDs. I have used DVD Decrypter with success, on one disk anyway.
The legal position in the UK is unclear (to me). It appears that the European Union Copyright Directive (EUCD) should and probably will be implemented in some form, but is still being wrangled over. When it is law it will apparently become a crime to even discuss methods of copying this stuff, let alone copy a cd to your pc, or copy a disk to use in your car.
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I would like to copy a write-protected dvd for my own use (so frequent use/not so gentle handling by others will not damage the original). I use Ashampoo to copy/burn, but this will not copy write-prot disks. Any recommendations? My preference is for lean simple software, such as DVD Shrink on Filehippo.
Oh yeah, free.
PS It seems that in the US, which I am not, it is legal to make copies but not legal to distribute software to do so. I don't know the position in the UK. That possibly explains why the software available seems to have stopped delevopment around 2005.
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Presumably so you could invoke the secure delete option, otherwise shift/del, as you say.
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Just looks like spamming an eighteen-month old thread to me.
Exclude Recent fails
in CCleaner Bug Reporting
Posted
Jeez, you're right. Although Analyse doesn't show the lnk files to be deleted, Clean just goes ahead and deletes them anyway.
Not only that, but it removes the whole blooming folder as well, with poor old Windows having to recreate it again.