Free Space discrepancy

[westyellmt]

Hi All,
I have a 3.1Gig HDD partitioned into C,D, & E. This is a Win95b system. In "My Computer" C: shows free space of 206MB and a capacity of 1.36GB, D: shows free space of 338MB and a capacity of 806MB, E: shows free space of 251MB and a capacity of 893MB. However if I go to Control Panel|System|Performance|Virtual Memory, C: shows a free space of 306MB (100MB different from "My Computer" data), partitions D: & E: both show the same amount of free space as did "My Computer", that is 338MB and 251MB respectively. My question is: who's telling the truth and who's lying? Why is C: showing 206MB in one and 306MB in the other? Thanks for any thoughts on this. Harry
P.S. I believe that 306MB is correct based on my observations of the free space on C: over the past couple of months.

[Rossgr]

Sounds to me like you have a FAT16 HD. A 1G FAT16 drive will have 32K clusters so even a 1K icon takes up 32K on the HD. The difference between File size and HD space used is called the slack space of your HD. Win95b is cabable of FAT32 so you should be able to reformat to FAT32 this will create 4k clusters, thus greatly reducing the slack space.

[ixl]

Is your swap file 100 MB by any chance? I just checked and the difference in my case is the size of my permanent swap file. The virtual memory thing obviously doesn't count the swap file since it assumes you may be changing its location.
Check that and let me know, I'd be curious.

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Charles M. Kozierok ( ixlubb@PCGuide.com )
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...

[westyellmt]

Thanks for the responses. Yes my Swap File is 100MB. The problem is up until a couple of days ago I had it set at 150MB and still had ~290-300MB showing as free on C: in "My Computer". I probably should mention that about two weeks ago I had a severe problem at boot up. The POST went fine and the Windows Splash screen came up but about ten seconds or so into the Windows load I got a message saying that several .exe and .dll files were missing/corrupted and Windows could not be loaded. I ran scan disk from DOS and let it fix the multiple errors that it found. I could then get the little darling to load Windows. Once there however I discovered I had some other minor issues, i.e. nothing listed under Start|Programs, no email addresses in my address book, etc. I got everything running again (in a fashion) and did notice that I have some duplicate directories in C: A couple of days later I had some more problems with missing or corrupted executables and .dlls and noticed some of these were associated with Zone Alarm. I uninstalled Zone Alarm and notified their tech support of the problems. They responded that they had seen "similar" issues with ZoneAlarm and Win95. Anyway ever since those happy moments my free space on C: has been mysteriously shrinking and I have no idea why. Harry

[ixl]

The issue with the discrepancy between My Computer and the virtual memory area is, I believe, what we were discussing. If space is disappearing in other ways, there could be a file system problem related to that "fun" you were having. I would recommend scanning your disks routinely, and watch for any errors that shouldn't be occuring. Could be the drive is going (but probably not). Sorry not to be more helpful.

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Charles M. Kozierok ( ixlubb@PCGuide.com )
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...