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Recycler = recycle bin?

Discussion in 'Windows XP' started by maureen, 2004/10/05.

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  1. 2004/10/05
    maureen

    maureen Inactive Thread Starter

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    What is the "recycler?" Is it the recycle bin? I’m tempted to delete it because every time I run my antivirus it is showing the Netsky.Q worm in the recycler on C: I "ve gone into the recycle bin and searched for the infected file "DC4031.zip:\document.exe" and I cannot find it.

    the obvious thing is to empty the recycle bin, but this is a work computer, and I can’t tell you the number of times the recycle bin has saved our bacon for us. So, I’m hesitant to empty it, but why can’t I find it? I tried system restore and chose a month ago before I started noticing this problem, and it’s still there after the system restore: 1 virus in C:\recycler

    Here is it’s location. C:\RECYCLER\S-1-5-21-1958049829-1747267374-990447173-1003\DC4031.ZIP:\document.exe When I cut and paste this into my explorer address bar, the message says "page cannot be displayed." AV = AVG which has not put it into quarantine because it cannot access the file; OS = Win XP Home.

    Where is this thing hiding? Thanks for any help. This is bugging me….

    maureen
     
  2. 2004/10/05
    WhitPhil

    WhitPhil Inactive

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  4. 2004/10/05
    Newt

    Newt Inactive

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    Recycler contains the recycle bins for your PC. When you are logged on there should be 4 items in it if XP-home behaves like XP-pro does. I just checked to make sure and I see a folder that I own, a folder that the local Admin account owns and the matching recycle bins.

    If you have Windows Explorer set to show hidden & system files, you ought to have a display similar to the one pictured and ought to be able to empty yours and probably the local admin ones as well.

    I have never tried to delete the Recycler folder and don't even want to try. Not really sure what would happen if I managed to do it.
     
    Newt,
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  5. 2004/10/06
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    It is different on my XP-pro system:

    I have two harddisks with five partitions, C: - D: - E: - F: - G:

    C: - D: - F: are protected by Norton and have only a single "number-folder ".

    E: - G: are not protected by Norton and in addition to the "number-folder" there is a folder named NPROTECT.



    Christer
     
  6. 2004/10/06
    JSS3rd Lifetime Subscription

    JSS3rd Geek Member

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    To put a different spin on things, I just installed SP2 on my XP Pro laptop, but am still using SP1 on my XP Pro desktop. Normally, I keep the protected OS files hidden, as I usually have no need to look at them, and they tend to clutter up an otherwise (relatively) clean left pane in Windows Explorer. But, for purposes of this discussion, I have them showing on both computers.

    I have four partitions on each computer. The SP1 desktop shows both a Recycled and a RECYCLER folder for each partition, while the SP2 laptop shows only a RECYCLER folder. This is in addition to the Recycle Bin for each computer.

    Like Christer, I had an NPROTECT folder in each of the RECYCLER folders on the SP1 desktop, as well as a number of S-1-15-21- files and folders. The NPROTECT folders were full of out-of-date files/folders. Being an adventurous sort, I set out to find just what could be deleted.

    As it turns out, the "Recycled" folder, and everything in the RECYCLER folder (except one S-1-15-21- file) on each partition could be deleted. Those four files all have the same number, but only two have the same creation date. They cannot be deleted, as they are in use by the computer, making me think that they represent the "mother file" actually used by the Recycle Bin.

    After rebooting the computer, everything continues to work normally. Consequently, my gut feeling is that you can safely clear out a lot of dead wood by deleting the "Recycled" folder and as much as you can from the RECYCLER folder.

    Maureen, you may not realize that you don't have to empty the Recycle Bin in one fell swoop. Just as you can restore individual files from the Bin, you can selectively delete files by right-clicking on them and selecting Delete from the context menu.

    HTH.
     
    Last edited: 2004/10/06
  7. 2004/10/06
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    To elaborate on my Recycle Bin condition:

    I have Norton Protection disabled on two partitions, E: - G:
    These partitions contain Ghost Images for which there is no reason to have NP active.
    These two partitions have a "number-folder" which is 85 bytes and a NPROTECT-folder which is 646,528 bytes. Exactly identical on both partitions and nothing has been deleted from them since they were formated.
    I am somewhat ...... :confused: ...... over the NPROTECT-folders being on partitions NOT PROTECTED but the folders contain a single file, NPROTECT.LOG.

    I have NORTON PROTECTION enabled on three partitions, C: - D: - F:
    These partitions are system, data and backup respectively and they all have a single "number-folder" which is 85 bytes when the Recycle Bin is empty.

    When I reinstalled XP with SP2 slipstreamed, all partitions except the freshly formatted system partition, had two "number-folders" in RECYCLER, a total of 170 bytes when empty. I subsequently reformated all partitions and they were all back to a single "number-folder ". (This was prior to installing Norton.)

    My conclusion is that when moving harddisks between computers, each installation creates its own "number-folder" in RECYCLER. This is what I did with my slave harddisk and the two non-system partitions on the master harddisk when I reinstalled. I moved those partitions from one system to another.

    My bet is that a harddisk that gets moved between computers will have one "number-folder" for each computer that has "seen it ". I remember a confusing situation regarding the Recycle Bin when I installed a friends harddisk in my mobile rack. The Recycle Bin icon on the desktop was empty but there were several MB in the RECYCLER-folder on my friends harddisk, files not removed from the Recycle Bin on his computer. I eventually noticed that it had been emptied but how it got emptied, I don't know.

    One final note:

    The folder RECYCLER is associated with NTFS partitions. FAT32 partitions have a folder named Recycle Bin.

    Christer
     
  8. 2004/10/06
    JSS3rd Lifetime Subscription

    JSS3rd Geek Member

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    Christer ...

    FYI, no Norton here. I had SystemWorks installed long ago, but thought I had removed every vestige of it. I agree that it makes no sense that your un-Norton-protected partitions should have an NPROTECT folder but it makes me wonder if those two partitions were ever Norton-protected. ???

    If so, and you subsequently removed the protection, perhaps Norton created the NPROTECT folder at that time, to save whatever had been previously protected. As I mentioned, the data in the NPROTECT folders on my XP desktop was WAY out of date.

    In any event, I wasn't aware of the NPROTECT folders until I went looking for them this morning, simply because I normally keep the protected OS files hidden on my XP computers. I deleted them, and they were not re-created on reboot.
     
  9. 2004/10/06
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    Jim,

    Norton Protection was disabled for those two partitions immediately after creating and formating. The partitions were completely empty until after rebooting when the 85 bytes "number-folders" appeared.

    I had created three images to each partition when the NPROTECT folders appeared. This may have coincided with 2 fragments - 8kb - \ [Directory] [Excess Allocation] appearing in Diskeepers Analyze Report.
    The files in both NPROTECT folders have the same time stamp, today at the exactly same second. I assume that they are updated when rebooting.

    The size of some 631kb is also confusing since they only contain a few symbols on the first row. There are several "empty" rows to scroll down and I assume that this log file is designed to be a fixed size in order to prevent defragmentation. When information is added, it is inserted, replacing an empty spot. (I have seen programs and their associated files work that way.)

    Christer
     
  10. 2004/10/06
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    I just rebooted to see if I was right but I wasn't. The time stamp didn't change so, I have no idea what triggers an update but they DO get updated.

    Christer
     
  11. 2004/10/06
    maureen

    maureen Inactive Thread Starter

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    Hi everyone, I'm back. WhitPhil - I tried housecall by trend micro, checked the "auto-clean" box before running the scan on C: -- TM found the worm also, I clicked on delete, and the worm is gone "“ I confirmed this by running another scan.

    Turns out that TM’s online scan also identified two more viruses that AVG had also found, but neither program could access them "Scan Result: CanNot Access," "not cleanable." The log showed the files were quarantined in a store folder created by an old spam filter that has expired, but they were not accessible because the folder was "in use." I could not access them manually either, windows would not let me delete them because they were running. I had to disable the program in misconfig, restart the computer and then go back in there and delete its store folder which was no longer "in use." That took care of the two viruses that were on the computer but always showing up as "quarantined."

    back to recycler: Newt and Jim "“ just like Christer, my recycler is different from yours. My recycler only contains the one string "S-1-5-21-1958…â€, not four strings or any deadwood folders like "recycled." I have two partitions, C: and D:, but D: is a hidden restore partition, never deleted anything from there which may be why there is no second string in recycler. My settings have always been to show hidden files, yet nowhere in the Recycler was I able to search and I find the DC4031.zip:\document.exe file. I know you can selectively delete individual items from the recycle bin, I just never could find this one, even with hidden files enabled. I’ve noticed it makes a difference what you see, if you enter recycle bin through the desktop icon or through recycler in windows explorer. Click on the desktop icon and you don’t see the string.

    So, anyway, the problem is solved thanks to Trend Micro, but the mystery of hidden things in the recycler remains. Well, maybe someday we’ll run across it again.

    thanks everyone for your help!

    maureen
     
  12. 2004/10/06
    Paul

    Paul Inactive

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    A little bit more info on the recycler...

    http://support.microsoft.com/defaul...port/kb/articles/Q171/6/94.ASP&NoWebContent=1

    IIRC you can also delete the contents from the recycler folders. I haven't for some time, but did on a couple of occasions without ill effect.

    If files won't delete from the recycler folders, it usually indicates that these files (programmes) were deleted by another user logged on at the time. Logging in as that user should allow full deletion.

    HTH
     
    Last edited: 2004/10/06
  13. 2004/10/07
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    We seem to have derailed Maureen's thread into a in-depth discussion on the Recycle Bin ...... :( ...... sorry about that.

    Anyway, when my backup harddisk died, I promptly scavenged another for temporary use for backups. At that time, I still hadn't installed XP-SP2 clean but was still on XP-SP1 with SP2 on top.
    I put that harddisk in the mobile rack and in RECYCLER there was a single "number-folder" which was different from the "number-folders" on the other partitions. After opening and closing the Recycle Bin on the desktop, there was a second "number-folder ", identical to the ones on the other partitions. Both were 85 bytes and empty.

    From Paul's post:

    As the single user of my computer, I overlooked multiple user accounts. There will probably be one "number-folder" for each user account and if a harddisk is moved between several computers with several users ...... :eek: ...... it can get pretty messed up ...... :confused: ...... I guess.

    Christer
     
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