[mapste]

I have an external Maxtor One Touch 4 Plus drive that I use for backup files. I use Drag and Drop for individual files and Windows Backup for full PC backups.

It's a 230GB drive that has only 45GB free. I deleted 10 of my 20 backup files, emptied the Recycle Bin, ran Disk Cleanup and Disk Defrag. Per disk properties, I did not recover any free space.

Suggestions?

 

[pip22]

Free space may be being wrongly reported, so run the Error Checker on that drive:
right-click drive icon > Properties > Tools > click "Check Now".
Tick both options > click 'OK'.

 

[mapste]

I ran the CHKDSK as you suggested. (Thanks, I hadn't thought to do that.) It showed no problems, and did not change the free space. However, when I deleted 5 more backup files, I immediately got about 30GB more free space. From what I have on this drive, I could swear I'm only using about 120GB, but it's reporting 170GB. Maybe I'm way off base, but at least now it did free up the space as soon as I deleted something, for whatever reason.

When I tried running Norton Disk Doctor on it, I got an error that the Master Partion Table for disk 2 was damaged. Since CHKDSK didn't have a problem, I chose not to let Norton do anything, especially since I don't know what "disk 2" is -- the drive is not partitioned. Any thoughts on Disk Doctor?

When looking at Properties, what does the "Compress this drive to save disk space" do? Is that something I would want to do on a backup drive?

Thanks so much for your help.

 

[spunk.funk]

Compressing files to save space, is exactly what it says. It compresses the files to save space. You would only want to do this if you are running out of space. HDD's are cheap right now, you can always get a much larger one and if you are deleting your old backups that you will not use, there is no reason to compress files.

 

[mapste]

OK, thanks.

Anyone have any thoughts on Norton Disk Doctor?

 

[spunk.funk]

Check Disk should have found any problem. Since this isn't a boot drive, it shouldn't matter too much. If you feel it is taking to long to access the drive, then have Norton Fix it, be sure to back up just in case.

 

[mapste]

Not having any problem on disk speed, so I'll leave it alone.

Thanks, this is a great forum!