303 GB of unknown files

[waynearr]

Hello,
I am running out of disk space on a 500 GB Hard Drive, I ran WinDirStat and it tells me I have 303 GB of Unknown files that I can not find on my Computer. I am running Windows 7. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

[te100]

Did you install 7 as an upgrade? Did you check disk cleanup?

 

[Hawkeye22]

It lists unknown files as files whose extensions aren't registered in the registry. So, if you have a file named Mybackup.spq, windirstat doesn't know what a spq file is. This does not necessarily mean it's a file you don't need. I think if you click on unknown or it's position on the graph, it will list the file names in that group.

 

[the great randini]

DirStat (Win, Linux, & Mac)
Is you hard drive almost full and don’t know why? Instead of going file by file looking for the culprit try this nifty tool. It will scan your hard drive and compare files, finding the fattest ones. Once the scans done, it will display a grid of blocks. The larger the block the bigger the file. Use caution, some of the larger files may be important system files.

 

[Hawkeye22]

DirStat (Win, Linux, & Mac)
Is you hard drive almost full and don’t know why? Instead of going file by file looking for the culprit try this nifty tool. It will scan your hard drive and compare files, finding the fattest ones. Once the scans done, it will display a grid of blocks. The larger the block the bigger the file. Use caution, some of the larger files may be important system files.

That's what WinDirStat does. The Op says he's used that already in his first post.

 

[waynearr]

It lists unknown files as files whose extensions aren't registered in the registry. So, if you have a file named Mybackup.spq, windirstat doesn't know what a spq file is. This does not necessarily mean it's a file you don't need. I think if you click on unknown or it's position on the graph, it will list the file names in that group.

It does not allow me to open unknown in the WinDirStat program. In my computer it does not show the unknown files, only accounts for 150 GB.

 

[Hawkeye22]

When you click on unknown, does it highlight or draw a box around the part of the graph? Never mind. I just tried it on mine. It only does this for known files types, sorry.

I'd run disk cleanup. be sure to use the advanced tab too. This will allow you to delete all but the last restore point. This generally opens up some free space. You can then go to your system restore settings and turn down the amount of drive space is allowed to be used for restore points.

 

[waynearr]

When you click on unknown, does it highlight or draw a box around the part of the graph? Never mind. I just tried it on mine. It only does this for known files types, sorry.

I'd run disk cleanup. be sure to use the advanced tab too. This will allow you to delete all but the last restore point. This generally opens up some free space. You can then go to your system restore settings and turn down the amount of drive space is allowed to be used for restore points.

Tried that, it doesn't solve my problem. How can I have 300GB's files that can not be accounted for?

 

[smorizio]

music..movies and photos add up fast...i would do a right click info on your folder to see what size they are. all it takes is 10 movies that been downloaded or ripped if there 5-8 gig is size.to take a good chunk of hard disk space. also try an online scan and some malware scan see if there a bug doing it to you.

 

[Cameron W]

music..movies and photos add up fast...i would do a right click info on your folder to see what size they are. all it takes is 10 movies that been downloaded or ripped if there 5-8 gig is size.to take a good chunk of hard disk space. also try an online scan and some malware scan see if there a bug doing it to you.

But would that not more than likely show on WinDirStat? The thing is I am having almost the exact same problem and it seemed to have appeared after I ran a backup to a networked home server and a chkdsk. It says I have 321 GB of bad sectors but then I ran Vivard (surface scan) and it says I'm clean. I used vssadmin and disk cleaning tools (Windows and ccleaner) to clear out backups and shadow copies yet the space remains filled. I am at a loss as to how this is happening.