Why is the Windows 8 recycle bin using more space than it is allocated?

Posted by oldmankit on Super User See other posts from Super User or by oldmankit
Published on 2014-01-22T07:52:47Z Indexed on 2014/06/11 9:29 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 254

Filed under:

windows-8

|

recycle-bin

I ran WinDirStat to scan the contents of my hard drive. I was surprised to see that the $RECYCLE.BIN folder on my D: drive takes 26 GB of space. I emptied the recycle bin, refreshed the folder in WinDirStat, but it still takes 26 GB of space.

I reduced the Maximum size of the recycle bin for this drive to 10000 MB for the main user of this computer, and disabled the recycle bin for the other user, and refreshed the folder in WinDirStat, but it still takes 26 GB of space.

I ran (in an elevated window) rd /s D:\$Recycle.bin, and refreshed the folder in WinDirStat, and finally it became empty.

Why was it taking up space even after I emptied it?
Why was it taking more space (26 GB) than the maximum allowed amount (10 GB)?

Update: After six months of using Windows (no re-install and no changes of settings related to the Recycle Bin) I used WinDirStat to check how big D:\$RECYCLE.BIN has become. It is now 29 GB. In Recycle Bin Properties, I select drive D, and it is still a custom maximum size (10000 MB).

© Super User or respective owner

Related posts about windows-8

Server 2012 DFS New Member Issue

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I am trying to add a new member to our DFS topology. We have 3 DCs (VMs - VMware) running Windows server 2012, two servers are located in or Primary site and the third at our DR site. Currently the two servers at our primary site are currently replicating DFS (full mesh) and are working fine. I have… >>> More
error in IIS7 but not on IIS6

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I have a website that is we are now deploying to windows 2008 servers that has worked in the past on IIS6 without a problem. It is using .net 2 framework. Most of the website works. Just when we create a screen report over a certain size on the server we get this error. Event code: 3005 Event… >>> More
error in IIS7 but not on IIS6

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I have a website that is we are now deploying to windows 2008 servers that has worked in the past on IIS6 without a problem. It is using .net 2 framework. Most of the website works. Just when we create a screen report over a certain size on the server we get this error. Event code: 3005 Event… >>> More
Microsoft Management Console stops working when I add snap-in to it

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I have Windows 7 Ultimate OS. I'm opening mmc.exe as administrator and trying add Certificates or any other snap-in, then while loading that snap-in MMC breaks and displays following message and after that it closes automatically once I click on close button on that message. What could be the problem… >>> More
Handling keyboard and mouse input (Win API)

as seen on Game Development - Search for 'Game Development'
There is a number of ways to catch mouse or keyboard under Windows. So I tried some of them, but every of them has some advantages and drawbacks. I want to ask you: Which method do use? I've tried these: WM_KEYDOWN/WM_KEYUP - Main disadvantage is that, I can't distinguish between left and right-handed… >>> More

Related posts about recycle-bin

Add the Recycle Bin to Start Menu in Windows 7

as seen on How to geek - Search for 'How to geek'
Have you ever tried to open the Recycle Bin by searching for “recycle bin” in the Start menu search, only to find nothing? Here’s a quick trick that will let you find the Recycle Bin directly from your Windows Start menu search. The Start menu search may be the best timesaver ever added to… >>> More
Recovering files that do not appear in the Recycle Bin, but are in the $Recycle.bin folder on external drive

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
Problem: I have an NTFS external drive with a $Recycle.bin folder on the root (E:/$Recycle.bin/) that has about 70gb worth of data. For whatever reason, the folder is no longer a hidden system file and no Windows machine I have used the drive on will show the files in the actual Recycle Bin. What… >>> More
Why is the Windows 8 recycle bin using more space than it is allocated?

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I ran WinDirStat to scan the contents of my hard drive. I was surprised to see that the $RECYCLE.BIN folder on my D: drive takes 26 GB of space. I emptied the recycle bin, refreshed the folder in WinDirStat, but it still takes 26 GB of space. I reduced the Maximum size of the recycle bin for this… >>> More
C#/.NET: Retrieving the contents/file attributes from a file inside a recycle bin

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
Hi, I just wanna ask if there's a possibility to retrieve the contents of a 'dump' file from the recycle bin programatically. The contents that I'm looking for are file attributes like 'Date Last Modified, 'Data created', 'size', etc (without restoring the file itself to the original location to… >>> More
How to fix Windows 7 always delete file permanently

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I am using a laptop from my company, installed with Windows 7. I found that I cannot delete the files to Recycle Bin. The files will always deleted permanently without going to the Recycle Bin. I am sure that the setting of the Recycle Bin is not "Remove files immediately when deleted". Then, I… >>> More