Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)

Subject: Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Dec 02 - 10:09 AM

I have 4 machines in the house - all running W2K. One of them, AMD Athlon 800MHz, 40Gb disk 128Mb memory - identical to another apart from mother board and software - will not run the disk cleanup utility. The others are all OK. Don't seem to have a virus.

It just sits there saying it's calculating how much free space I will be able to save and doing nothing for hours... Task manager says the processor is running at 100% but there is no disk activity or any indication that anything is going on.

I have de-fragged the disk sucessful and there is no other apparant problem. It's driving me bonkers!

Any ideas?

Dave the Gnome

Subject: RE: Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 22 Dec 02 - 01:52 PM

There was a glitch on W2K disc scan, on some of the earlier versions. I found a patch for it on the Windows update site. Failing that Norton System Doctor will do it for you.
Giok

Subject: RE: Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Dec 02 - 01:52 PM

I don't find anything immediately obvious at Mickey'$ house, and haven't had a problem like this with our Win2K machine. For reference, everyone should have a "Favorites" link set to Search Microsoft Knowledge Base, and another to Windows Update.

Win2K can run on either a FAT32 or NTFS format, and there are some articles at the Mickey$oft Knowledge Ba$e that indicate that some services can be a little flaky on NTFS. You can check which you have by opening Windows Explorer and right-click/Properties on the drive. Problems seem to be especially likely if the drive has had something like NT4 on it before migrating to Win2K.

Win2K can have multiple "users" defined, and each user has a completely separate "path" for everything, including temp files, so it's entirely possible that the utility is being directed to do quite a lot of stuff to compile the cleanup list - although the usual problem is that you have to log on as each user and run once for each username to get a good cleanup.

Programs that run in a "quiet mode" can foul on permissions. If they try to access files that the logged-on-user doesn't have "permission" to access, they may keep trying to get in, and never will. If you haven't already, log on as "Administrator" and try running the cleanup.

If you go thru Start - Programs - Accessories - System Tools - System Information, the SI window has a Tools tab that lets you access several "Sytem verification" type tools - including a System File verifier - that help automate looking for file corruptions in Windows System files. If it finds something it will probably ask for your install disk to get good files.

You can do a "manual" cleanup using Windows Explorer: Go to My Computer\C:\Documents and Settings\. Each "folder" there represents a "user." You need to follow each one down to "Local Settings" and find the TEMP and Temporary Internet folders - where you can delete most of the crap (but save your 'cat cookie). There are also some temp files under C:\WINNT, but they don't usually accumulate much.

Sorry I can't offer more specific help. Maybe when SWMBO gets off our 2K machine I can look at the help files for some better ideas.

John

Subject: RE: Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Dec 02 - 01:58 PM

Giok had the better idea while I was typing (and pretending to think). The Windows update site I linked above will offer to download a utility to your machine that will look at what they've got that you "should have." You then have the option of Yes/No for anything they offer.

I'll note that a few of the recent "critical updates" are really large, and if you haven't updated in a while there may be some that need "separate installs." You can bypass them to get the one you want, if it's offered.

John

Subject: RE: Tech: Disk cleanup doesn't! (W2K)
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 May 03 - 04:00 AM

Well - getting on for 6 months down the line I found a fix! It was hanging on calculating how much space it would save compressing old files. This apparantly a bug which only manifests itself on some configurations. The only fix is to edit out the bit where it says compress old files from the registry. Did that and the rest of it works fine.

Don't you just love Micros&$t

Cheers

DtG