# huge numbers of missing files after moving folders



## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

hi,
In the course of backing up my computer, I decided to break up some large folders into smaller ones.
Everything seemed to go fine.
However when I moved around 250gb total into several smaller folders, the new sum was less than half that.
I moved some more around. The "properties" keeps showing numbers much smaller than what is apparently in the folder. When I go into each folder, and click on internal folders, the numbers are often higher than shows on the superset containing folder, which is obviously not possible.

Is this a Windows 10 bug, malware, a hardware fail? I don't know what to do and don't know whether this may have affected backups also.

My system is a Lenovo Ideacentre Y720 Cube-15ISH, there is a small solidstate drive but this is on the larger D drive which is not solid state. I have not tried this on the C drive. No idea when this started, it may have been a while and I am just noticing it now.


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

What backup program are you using?


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I was just manually copying to an external hard drive. But this wasn’t during the backup, and persisted after I had shut down and removed the external hard drive.

All of this within the D drive (sorry don’t know proper term but the 2T not-solid-state drive), my C drive is a small solid state drive. 
Basically, all on D drive, I opened several new folders, intending to break up a 256gb single folder into several smaller folders. The file moves appeared to work. But the summed size of the new folders was only a third of the original folder, and nothing should have been deleted.


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

If you didn't compact, try opening a few and see what you have.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

They seem to be there? 
And in This PC, the amount of storage in D hasn’t drastically changed. 
I can open individual files though this involves thousands and I only sampled a few. But unfortunately I don’t really know exactly what is supposed to be in these folders


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

For whatever it’s worth- some path names might be too long, I’ve been moving folders to the D folder by way of shortening path names / lengths / number of levels of nested folders


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

To check further against original drive as to what you have, use the filing method i.e. alpha, date or whatever and select from beginning to middle to end. If OK, you probably have everything. There are many options to verify when copying files.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I'm so sorry, I don't understand - you mean take the drive I used originally to upload to the D drive? Also you mean just look at the file lists? I can do that if that seems best.

As far as the backup to the external drive, I'm not worried about that, I have others and can redo that.

I'm mostly worried that I have a corrupt file system, or something wrong with file addressing, or a bad disk or bad sector, something like that... I found a tool recommended on this site called Space Sniffer but wasn't able to figure out whether it is ok for Windows 10


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

I can't see how SpaceSniffer could help your situation. Yes, I meant look at a select group of files from start middle and end of each disc.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I think I want to open that drive on a different computer just in case... will have a better answer by tomorrow afternoon.


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## djaburg (May 15, 2008)

I know when I move data around I almost always use ROBOCOPY and it works great. If you enable logging on it, you can see how many files on the source, how many files were copied, and unlike manually copying data it won't stop in the middle if there's an issue with a file. Another great advantage is you can have it retain all original folder and file date/times. Here's technet article with examples.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

thank you, Robocopy sounds perfect but I have a (probably lame) question. I couldn’t find a download link, is this something I run from cmd shell?


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

In Command Prompt> C:robocopy\>Then C: what you're copying then C: what you're receiving. I realize what I just typed is confusing so I found an old site that still applies in Windows 10: http://burpee.smccme.edu/studenthowtos/robocopy.htm


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

Thanks! Backing up my backup, then will start comparing files as suggested a couple of posts above.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

hi, thank you all. So now I have backed up my backup and apot-checked against the original D drive that was a concern. Also before I did that, in order to reduce the number of levels of nested folders, I had pulled some out of subfolders and up to the D drive level. As far as I can tell, no specific files are missing. 

But why would it show such incredibly incorrect numbers as far as folder sizes? It makes me very concerned re some kind of addressing or other file issue?


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

Corday, looking at your post again, I think I didn't quite follow the instructions. But how would I know what is at beginning middle or end of a given disc?


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

By actually looking at a file on each disc. BTW, the built in Windows backup tells which files if any couldn't be copied. This doesn't apply to your situation but just FYI.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

As far as I can figure out it’s all there.
In case this is related- for a while I’ve been noticing that search doesn’t work correctly. For example I might get a message no files found, even though I can see a file name that should have been found by the search?


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

With Windows 10 home you can't substitute the "old" search box for Cortana which you can do with Pro. You could with a Registry change, but I wouldn't recommend it. Better just to open File Explorer and either look at your personal files by name or "Search" there.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I never use Cortana, all of this happening while searching in File Explorer.

Typically what I do, is open File Explorer, get to a subfolder (usually on the same D drive, C is just a 128gb drive and I try to keep it empty), then type in the search box on top. I think that’s what you are saying is the right thing?

By the way do you think upgrading to Pro would help my issues?


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

No. Upgrading won't help, however I have pro on two units and home on the third.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I have this and an old laptop upgraded to Windows 10 home that I use occasionally. Maybe I will upgrade one to Pro to get better control over other things.

But what do you think is going on with the folder sizes being wrong? This is by orders of magnitude sometimes. I do definitely nest folders in folders probably up to 5, 6 maybe more levels, might that contribute? Is there a maximum recommended folder size, some of my folders are over 250gb?


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

NTFS : Maximum number of files in a single folder: 4,294,967,295
NTFS allows file compression.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

I never use compression.... I don’t think my entire computer has 4billion files. But the original mystery is still mysterious?


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## TechSpeedy (Jun 4, 2018)

IF some files are missing when we are moved the folder because i think some files are corrupted. I think this is the resgion.


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

Corrupted files can copy and Xcopy. The only way to know is when you attempt to open them. Encrypted files copying needs special procedure.


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

The ones I’ve tried seem to open etc with no problem, so I don’t think corruption would be likely?
A while back on a different thread I saw something about re-indexing, maybe that is relevant , if you think so I will try that, let me know


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

If it's this one: https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/windows-81-search-index it's not relevant. To be sure it's not a hardware problem, from an elevated Command Prompt Run chkdsk/r ---If it shows bad sectors, that's where missing files have gone (if any are really missing).


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## newbee_4 (Mar 23, 2007)

will do, thanks, probably have results tomorrow


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