Shadow Copy Service and Disk Usage
RafaelFR
Posted messages
11
Status
Member
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Manstein -
Manstein -
Hello,
On my system partition C:\ (Velociraptor 150 GB HDD), I have a recent installation of Windows 7 Ultimate 64. To date, this corresponds to about 175,000 files and 55 GB of data.
In order to back up files, I installed the freeware Cobian Backup. During the installation, it offers to install Microsoft's Shadow Copy service. However, since this installation, my system disk has only 4 GB free out of the 139 available.
Despite uninstalling the Shadow Copy service, the Cobian Backup software, and performing a complete cleanup with CCleaner, I still can't recover any free space.
I've uploaded a screenshot that shows the discrepancy of about 80 GB between the file size on the disk (as indicated by WinDirStat) and the free space displayed by Windows Explorer: https://twitpic.com
If you have any ideas, I would appreciate your help.
Rafael.
On my system partition C:\ (Velociraptor 150 GB HDD), I have a recent installation of Windows 7 Ultimate 64. To date, this corresponds to about 175,000 files and 55 GB of data.
In order to back up files, I installed the freeware Cobian Backup. During the installation, it offers to install Microsoft's Shadow Copy service. However, since this installation, my system disk has only 4 GB free out of the 139 available.
Despite uninstalling the Shadow Copy service, the Cobian Backup software, and performing a complete cleanup with CCleaner, I still can't recover any free space.
I've uploaded a screenshot that shows the discrepancy of about 80 GB between the file size on the disk (as indicated by WinDirStat) and the free space displayed by Windows Explorer: https://twitpic.com
If you have any ideas, I would appreciate your help.
Rafael.
11 answers
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Run the vssadmin command in administrator mode:
Start -> All Programs Accessories, right-click on
Command Prompt -> Run as administrator. -
With the command del , it is possible to get rid of this folder, read the
third message above. -
Hello.
There must be hidden files, do this:
Start -> Run, type cmd.exe
In the command prompt window, enter
cd c:\users
dir /a:hs /s /p -
Hello Morganch,
The list is too long for the command prompt and for me to reproduce it here.
Is there anything specific I should look at in the listing?
Additionally, I am adding to my question with supplementary elements obtained from the site https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/166102-shadow-copies-delete.html, an article explaining how to delete instances of shadow copies for Windows 7 and Vista.
When using the command [code]vssadmin Delete Shadows /For=C: /All[/code], I receive the following message:
"Error: Snapshots were detected but they were outside of your allowed context. Try deleting them with the backup application that created them."
No mention of this on the Cobian site/forum.
Any idea?
Thank you for your help.
Rafael. -
I have indeed executed these commands as an admin.
However, the message indicated was obtained via the command:vssadmin Delete Shadows /shadow={ef064cbb-e76d-461c-b8ed-3b3577968132}
and notvssadmin Delete Shadows /For=C: /All
as I mentioned above.
{ef064cbb-e76d-461c-b8ed-3b3577968132} refers to the ID of the snapshot I am trying to delete, an ID obtained using the commandvssadmin list shadows
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You also need to set the Instant Snapshots service to manual.
Start -> Run , type services.msc -
I checked, the service is started and set to manual.
I restarted it and relaunched my deletion command: same result. -
Just don't start it, because it will continue to make backups incessantly; you might as well disable it.
With the command dir /a:hs /s /p, can you locate where this folder
{ef064cbb-e76d-461c-b8ed-3b3577968132} is? -
Thank you for the time you are spending on my problem.
I just disabled the two services: "Volume Shadow Copy" and "Windows Software Shadow Copy Provider".
I'll reboot and let you know if it allowed me to recover some disk space. -
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First of all, there is no reference to "ef064cbb-e76d-461c-b8ed-3b3577968132" either among the files and folders on the disk (unhidden system files) or in the registry.
Furthermore, the key ef064cbb-e76d-461c-b8ed-3b3577968132 is not constant over time. Indeed, if I stop the "Volume Shadow Copy" service, the ID of the shadow copy is updated after restarting.
So I looked for the current ID, but after re-enabling the two services "Volume Shadow Copy" and "Windows Software Shadow Copy Provider," the command"vssadmin list shadows"
returns the following result:
"There are no items corresponding to the request."
I have lost visibility of the instance to delete without having found the trace of the missing 80 GB ://