Augeas

I would think that most users of this facility would be using it to reclaim hd space, or under the impression that it is reclaiming hd space (as the OP mentions). Piriform however say that it's a security feature, preventing someone from restoring to a previous undesired state. There's no mention of freeing any space, in fact they say that CC 'may not actually remove all files related to each point'. It looks as if only the 'pointer' is removed. Personally I think it's too much of a faff, just set the sys restore space to the minumum figure and let Windows do the tidying up. Trying to do it manually on a moving target is pretty pointless. I was going to say restore pointless, but thought better of it.

What you're saying then Alan is that if you delete any restore point than you can't vaidly restore to to prior point, as a RP in the chain is missing? Or do Piriform know more than us punters, as CC allows us to do this?

I suppose I'll have to stop posting in invisible ink.

Options/Settings/Secure Deletion/Secure File deletion/Simple Overwrite will tell CC to overwrite (almost) all files on deletion, making them unrecoverable. To overwrite files previously (unsecurely) deleted you will need to run Wipe Free Space.

I don't think there is a problem, I seem to remember that all points could be deleted on the first implementation of this feature, but was quickly changed to preserve the latest point as a safety measure, just as Windows does. Your last two sentences imply that you want to keep your latest user-created point, it's rather confusing. Just wait a few hours and another point will be created and become the latest, and you can then get rid of the point you want to.

I don't think that wipe free space takes any notice of the chosen deletion method, just gives you one pass of zeroes. I think you're spot on Glenn, the time is all down to write speed and not a lot to do with processor speed or usage.

Correct.

Try running the scan with the Scan for Non-Deleted Files option ticked. I guess you're runnning a deep scan? If you have to rescan try a normal scan first with the above option shown. If no-go then try the deep scan with the above etc.

I think that everyone runing CC with Firefox open will get this message. Do you have Internet Cache ticked in Cleaner/Applications/Firefox, and if you right click on that item and select Analyse, do you get a filecount/data count? After you've closed FF that is.

I thnk that one of the dev's posted that shortly after the wipe free space option came out (on Feb 27 09) but I can't find the reference now. In any event the wipe speed indicates that it's one pass. If anyone tried to Gutmannise wipe free space then they'd still be waiting for it to complete. That's terabytes of writing.

Well, CC isn't, and has never claimed to be, a forensic cleaner. It's a widely used, easy to use, general purpose utility that clears temp and unneeded files from mainly home pc's. It has some data overwrite function that was possibly added in response to user demand. I wouldn't expect it to stand up against specialist data overwriters. Wipe Free Space uses one pass of zeroes, and (as far as I know, I haven't ever used it) doesn't touch the MFT, so all old file names will remain. I believe CC just uses the 'Fill the disk with large files then delete them' philosophy. It puts off casual probers.

It may be a misinterpretation of the word 'recoverable'. Recuva (in normal scan mode) will scan the MFT and return a list of file names from MFT entries which have been flagged as deleted. (No MFT entry is ever removed, just reused.) These entries still point to areas (clusters) on the disk that originally contained the file data. Recuva's secure overwrite option will overwrite the clusters that the entry in the MFT points to. The filenames and path info will remain, as Recuva is unable to overwrite MFT entry info. So a second scan of Recuva will show more or less the same list of filenames as you had before. After doing all this overwriting, all of the files can still be recovered. More correctly, the data in the clusters that the MFT entry points to can be recovered. The recovered data will however be rubbish, as it's been overwritten. So yes, you can recover them all but you shouldn't be able to recover a valid file. Except... The clusters that the (deleted file) MFT entry points to are legitimate areas to be used for new files to be created. So you could have a deleted MFT entry and an undeleted MFT entry pointing to the same space on disk. Recuva will not overwrite the valid data of the new file. However if you attempt to recover the deleted file you will actually get data from the new file. Confusing, eh? You will also see small files (under 1k) that can't be overwritten. This is because they fit entirely into the MFT entry, with no clusters elsewhere on disk. As Recuva can't overwrite MFT entries it cannot overwrite these files. I would not put too much faith in the good file/bad file indicators, especially if you run Recuva later, as you have done. I'm not sure how Recuva determines whether a file is recoverable or not, but it appears to be more an art than science. The test is whether the original data can be recovered. Keep testing.

Just open the Options box and select Gutmann in the Secure Overwrite section. Click OK, then do all the above. P.S. All the above refers to Advanced Mode, as I don't use the run Wizard. It's more or less the same anyway.

Hello again, YB. Set your display to List View, if you haven't already. After checking the files you wish to be overwritten, right click with that cute little mouse pointer hovering somewhere in the left-hand display panel. You should then get a selection box with quite a few options shown, one of which (the last) is Secure Overwrite Checked. Just click on this. You will be asked if you really want to do this, say Yes. Then you will see some action. You can highlight files to be deleted, but they have to be a contiguous bunch, and that cute etc. has to be hovering over the highlighted filenames to be effective. It's your pc, and your life, but I would do a simple one-pass overwrite of zeroes. It's the fastest method and is quite effective. My post count would be halved if Gutmann had kept his mouth shut.

Accoring to a recent post, and a little reasoning, that's the answer. Recuva can't access phone internals.

For info, Stage 2 has to be running to be cancelled, but it doesn't look as if this will ever happen anyway. As I assume from the system size and data volume the data must have some value. Have you contacted a data recovery company for advice? I think that they would be best equipped to recover this amount of data. It will cost, but we don't know the cost of not recovering it. It doesn't really look as if a self-recovery is going to work, and your disk(s), or the data on them, is possibly deteriorating as each day passes.

You have a point, of sorts, but it is hardly shocking. I think you're barking up the wrong tree. If you want to recover a file and don't have Recuva installed, then just looking at the Piriform docs will be overwriting data on the disk. Posting to this forum will overwrite data on the disk. Doing anything on a pc, even booting it up, will overwrite data on the disk. Leave your pc running without touching it and prefetch will do it's mini-defrag, sys restore will create 50 to 500 mb restore points daily, virus databases will update, and all this activity will be logged. It would be wise to include a comment in the docs to the extent that installation and recovery should be run on another volume, and perhaps a pop-up box to say the same when installing Recuva. But I dare say that the vast majority of users have only one pc, and will continue to use it, if only to browse the docs even if they download to a flash drive. Furthermore I would also say that the vast majority of users do not have, and are not expected to have, the depth of knowledge to realise that using their pc, and downloading and installing software, is endangering their chances of recovery. If Recuva is already installed then most of these comments still apply, people will use their pc's, either through necessity or lack of knowledge. A Recuva tutorial could describe the basics of data recovery, although only a percentage of users would read it prior to a real recovery need. I think that the point is that Recuva is not a forensic data recovery tool, but a very useful utility for general users. No forensic recovery process would use a Windows application to recover data. Forensic recovery procedures would immediately isolate the hard drive. Recuva doesn't do that. (I'm using forensic to describe serious data recovery.) As for installation instructions, just double-click and Bob's your uncle.

Options/View Mode/Tree View.

Fran, you might want to try cancelling Recuva stage 2. I always do this and it has no discernable effect on the results. The list is still produced and files can be recovered. Just chop it as soon as stage 1 has completed. (Your list is of course way out of my league.) Recovering files creates a new file, so the old deleted entry in the MFT still remains (the new file uses a 'random' deleted MFT entry). The new file will overwrite something if placed on the same disk - hence the warning message. I think it's safe to say that you must recover (if you get to that happy state) to another volume. Although you can filter the initial scan, as far as I know filtering just limits the display, the full scan is always done whatever the filter says, so you won't save much if any memory by filtering. Selecting a particular disk, if you can, would of course ease the problem.

Ident, do you mean (with answer two) that No, they won't be found, or No, that statement is incorrect? I think you mean the former. (I notice from a later post this evening that you are rather tardy in going to bed.) It is surprising what can actually be found by Recuva. All those edits, and sys restore copies, pagefile/cache clearouts, etc: Cc will not touch any of these. I'm with Alan, I rarely use secure deletion and I have never wiped. Free space, that is. You spend hours and hours with your disk banging away and the first time you use your pc it needs wiping again. But to each his own. Youngbear, click on the Last Modified column header, this will sort by date deleted.

I hate Marmite (you should have called yourself Nutella) but I agree with you, the greyed-out lettering does look as if the option is unavailable. Recuva doesn't have this quirk. But as a long-time user of both I'm used to the quirks and it doesn't bother me, although I can see that it could be confusing.

You are not in any immediate danger. Have you checked with Windows sys restore whether the restore points are there or not? I'm sure you will have one restore point at least so you have some emergency cover. You can create another point or wait a day for Windows to do it for you. There have been some comments on this in the past, I can only remember that ticking the Empty Recycler box seemed to be one suspect, but I thought that had been fixed. You could search the forum for info.

XP Home SP3 - sys restore populates very quickly (sorry, Dennis). It is also a feature I wouldn't use either. Are you sure it's turned on?

First of all double posting can frustrate other forum members, and responses should be posted here, not via pm's. I assume you have installed CC, have you run it yet? For new users I would leave the standard settings as they are. If you have changed anything then you can right-click on the headings on the Cleaner panel and select Restore Default State. With the default settings you are unlikely to come to any harm. Well, your pc won't. I would not touch the Registry section yet, and you don't have to have anything in the Include/Exclude sections yet, if at all. Leave System Restore points alone. So, just run the Cleaner section with default settings, and read docs.piriform.com I would want to remove everything in your list of cookies. I doubt if they're dangerous, you just don't want them. Either AVG or CC will, or should, remove them.

Are you running the latest version of CC (2.23.999)? I'm not aware of others experiencing this problem. A self-support forum is what you usually get with a free product, as I'm sure you know. I don't think that any widely known product, whether it had a bug reporting system or not, would escape problems being aired in the open. Windows has a built-in fault reporting system and the internet is full of real or imagined bugs. An open forum has the great advantage of providing an immediate solution, work round, it's-being-fixed, or live-with-it answer. Well, most times anyway.