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February Mailbag

Toronto Star Fast Forward column for February 1, 2001

Copyright © Myles White, 2001

Time, once again, to dip into the Computer Wares mailbag...

Our first letter comes from Stan Wade, via e-mail: I have a hidden folder called _restore which only shows 4 files in Windows Explorer. The folder properties list 151 files using 184 MB. I can view all these as I still use Winfile for some things. Do I need this folder, and does it belong to Windows System Restore or Norton's Recovery, or neither?

Myles replies: After exchanging another note with Stan, we ascertained he was using Windows Millennium Edition (information on which version of which operating system you're using is critical to troubleshooting). Indeed, these files are part of WinMe's System Restore tool (Start / Programs / Accessories / System Tools).

Each time you set a point to which you may wish to restore your system (say, prior to installing new software programs, updates, hardware driver files), the System Restore tool makes compressed copies of the information it needs to set your system back to a previous state. This hidden _restore folder is where they go – and as you can see from Stan's note, the amount of space they occupy can begin to mount up.

There's one other note to pass along about these files. Most versions of Symantec's Norton Anti-Virus are prevented by WinMe from changing the contents of this folder, so that if NAV finds a virus in a file, it cannot delete it, fix it, or inoculate it. In other words, you could restore your system to a previous state that also contains a virus!

Both Microsoft and Symantec "are working on the problem" but, in the meantime, have suggested workarounds to address it. Although Microsoft adds a suggestion to that of Symantec, both essentially recommend purging the affected (infected?) files. You can find the Microsoft solution at http://support.micorosoft.com (then search for specific article ID Q263455). Symantec's suggestion is at www.symantec.com/techsupp (then select your version of Norton Anti-Virus, click Go, click on Knowledge Base, then type System Restore in the search field).

One of the more interesting letters to come from my two-part article on partitioning hard drives had nothing to do with the topic. Brent Channel, via e-mail, writes: One thing I have heard a number of people say is that after a few years any Windows based PC will slow down and that it is a good idea to re-format your hard drive and re-install your software.

Myles Replies: Brent is correct about Windows-based PCs slowing down over time, even if all things are equal, but he's got the wrong solution. There may be a reason to re-format, and we'll get to that below, but in this case the answer is defragmenting, not re-formatting.

To explain what's going on here, we need a quick review of how files are stored on a hard drive. When you create a file (either by installing an application or using it to, for example, compose a letter to Uncle Fred), the operating system looks for sufficient space on your hard drive to store it. The drive (and all partitions on it) have been formatted so that it is magnetically divided into tracks, sectors, and clusters (the smallest portion the system can change).

Ideally, all new files should be written to clusters and sectors that are "contiguous" or right next to each other. However, if that's all that could happen – if files could only be written to a contiguous space to fit the exact file quantity – your drive would soon be full of files and spaces to small to hold whole files. The problem would get worse when you edited documents to make them longer or shorter, or deleted them altogether.

To get around this problem the system uses some form of file management system (it changes depending on the operating system and version of it you use). What that file system does is to write a portion of a file into any space than can hold part of it, then it keeps track of where the rest of the file is located – and these file fragments may be strewn more or less randomly all over the disk's surface.

That means when you go to read the file, the disk has to work harder, and it takes longer to deliver it to you than if the file were all in one series of contiguous spaces.

Now we come to a special file that Windows uses as a repository – called "virtual memory" or a dynamic swap file. This file is used when there isn't sufficient electronic memory available in your system to load all of the current applications and documents you're using. Windows is constantly swapping code out of memory and onto your hard drive (and vice versa) as it works. With a nice, large swap file (recommended size equal to 2.5 to 3 times as much as the amount of memory you have), Windows becomes more efficient. When that file is heavily fragmented, Windows works harder and you get another cause of slowdown.

To fix the problem, periodic use of the defragmentation tool is recommended (Start / Programs / Accessories / System Tools). If you have Windows 2000, you can get an idea of how badly your hard drive is fragmented by opening the defragmentation tool, then asking it to analyze the drive of your choice. It will show you graphically the mix of fragmented, contiguous, and system files, as well as free space remaining. It will also offer an opinion of whether your disk needs defragmenting or not. 

Earlier versions of Windows don't provide any clues, except for one slim one. Open My Computer, right-click on a drive icon, then select properties. Under the Tools tab, you'll find the defragger with a note from Windows telling you how long it has been since the last time you did a defrag. If the program says it doesn't know how long it's been, then it's about time.

A freshly defragmented disk will stop leaching speed from your system (and you may be quite surprised at how much faster it appears to work when you're done).

But what about re-formatting? This is a somewhat more controversial step to take, not one to be taken lightly, and it won't have any affect on the performance of your system (except that it may stop some other problems).

I mentioned above that during the formatting process, the surface of a disk is magnetically organized into tracks, sectors, and clusters. Over time – several years – that magnetic charge dissipates and the formatting begins to break down. You can hasten the process by having unshielded speakers, telephones, or electrical cables too near your system. You can also produce interesting results by grabbing the data cables inside the system while you're poking about there without dumping static electricity from your body, first.

The first warning you get that the formatting is breaking down is that random occurrences of "sector not found" begin to appear when you're searching for a file or files fail to load properly. Of course, you make regular backups of your data files, so this won't inconvenience you, too much.

Urk.

ScanDisk, by the way, doesn't fix the problem. Instead when it detects and "repairs" a bad sector or several, it merely marks the affected sectors as being bad so that the operating system won't write to them. That's sort of a repair, but not a great one.

There's yet another reason some people give for re-formatting and that's to clean out anything left over in the Windows Registry after a program is uninstalled. Windows is notorious for not being thorough in the process. And, it's true that reformatting your drive, then reinstalling Windows will clean out the Registry, but to my mind that's like swatting a mosquito with a nuclear weapon.

Remember that formatting is a destructive process. Not only will you need to re-install your operating system when you're done, but you'll need to restore all your applications, all of the customization you've done to them (including the update patches you've applied that you donwloaded from the Internet), your address books and e-mail files, your ICQ lists, the annotated spelling dictionaries, and so on. Then there are the drivers for all of your hardware devices (now, let me see; where did I put those disks?), plus any updates you've added to them since.

Of course, before you do this, making a full system backup or at least one that catches all the files noted above will be necessary, which in turn requires you to know which files are which (quick: tell me the name of the file in which all of your Outlook data is kept as well as where it is on your hard drive).

In short, reformatting your hard drive is a long, tedious task fraught with all sorts of hidden pitfalls and problems that you do only as a last resort.

I don't know what your time is worth, but all of this is a several-day process for most people, with no guarantee that you won't have more problems when you began than you did when you started. It's simpler to go and purchase a program such as Norton Cleansweep or MacAfee's Uninstaller. Both have sub-modules that will assist you in cleaning out and tightening up your Registry. Both are under $100, too.

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