funkyy Posted November 10, 2020 Share Posted November 10, 2020 I recently noticed that there are some hidden files in my recycle bin. They don't show up when I click "Show hidden files", but they do appear when I view my system contents with Treesize. One of the files is a "desktop.ini file so I assume that one is ok to keep. But the others are ".exe" files so I'd like to know what they are and if I can safely delete them. (I'm on Win7 (x64)). Any advice would be gratefully received. Here's a link to a screenshot on Imgur:- https://imgur.com/a/ACZUpmQ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolus Posted November 10, 2020 Share Posted November 10, 2020 Rename your "Recycle.bin" in "Recycle.old". After reboot, Windows create a new "Recycle.bin", then you can delete your "Recycle.old" with administrator rights one file after an other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkyy Posted November 11, 2020 Author Share Posted November 11, 2020 Many thanks Carolus, your instructions worked. First I made a complete image backup of my system just in case there was any problem afterwards. Then I read a little about the Recycle Bin and how it's a bit risky to tamper with system files etc. Anyway having the image as backup I felt confident about following your instructions. I used the program "Everything" to find the "$RECYCLE.BIN" folder and I re-named it "$RECYCLE.old" as you instructed and rebooted my system....and as you said, a new Recycle bin was created, and I just deleted "RECYCLE.old", I checked my system contents with Treesize again and the $RECYCLE.BIN folder is only kilobytes in size instead of 34MB that it showed when it contained those ".exe" files. Thanks for your clear advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolus Posted November 11, 2020 Share Posted November 11, 2020 Hello Funkky, Sometime, Recycle.bin get corrupted, I don't know why but I remember this trick from a reading long time ago. You can use also a software like totalcommander or Q-dir to explore your recycle.bin and look, from time to time. Look also on all your partitions because most of the time, if you have recycle.bin corrupted on C:, the others are the same way. If someone can explain why recycle.bin can be corrupted, it can be interesting for our knockledge. It's a problem with the Recycle hidden folder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkyy Posted November 11, 2020 Author Share Posted November 11, 2020 Hi Carolus, I'll have a look to see if there are any other folders with corruptions. It was strange because the hidden ".exe" files only showed up in "Treesize" and I would never have known they were there. I also have "Q-dir" in my portable collection so I'll use that later to check C. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chatman Posted November 13, 2020 Share Posted November 13, 2020 @funkyy I wonder why you need to rename Recycle Bin + Restart PC + delete Recycle Bin(Old)... when you can directly delete files from $Recycle.Bin showed by TreeSize? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mp68terr Posted November 13, 2020 Share Posted November 13, 2020 On 11/10/2020 at 9:23 PM, funkyy said: I recently noticed that there are some hidden files in my recycle bin... Also, ask yourself if you need the recycle bin. There are some reg tweaks to bypass it, set its size and nuke files at exit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkyy Posted November 13, 2020 Author Share Posted November 13, 2020 14 hours ago, Chatman said: @funkyy I wonder why you need to rename Recycle Bin + Restart PC + delete Recycle Bin(Old)... when you can directly delete files from $Recycle.Bin showed by TreeSize? Chatman, When I first discovered the hidden files I noticed that I could delete the files using Treesize, but I wasn't sure if deleting them was the right thing to do, so I went Googling for clues. Then I posted the problem here some days later. By the time I had read Carolus's instructions I had completely forgotten that I could delete them directly in Treesize!! lol. They don't call me "Funkyy the Fallable" for nothing!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkyy Posted November 13, 2020 Author Share Posted November 13, 2020 9 hours ago, mp68terr said: Also, ask yourself if you need the recycle bin. There are some reg tweaks to bypass it, set its size and nuke files at exit. Yep, thanks I know that...but I like to have the option to retrieve something from the recycle bin. It's not the first time I have deleted something useful and then thought Oh shhhhh-sugar!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aum Posted November 13, 2020 Share Posted November 13, 2020 4 hours ago, funkyy said: ... It's not the first time I have deleted something useful and then thought Oh shhhhh-sugar!! Not the only one, you. Shhhhh-sugar happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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