Hard disc full when there is still space...

kaisterkai

kaisterkai

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I just don't know what is happening, because my external says (on the side bar of window XP and on prop) that there is still 120GB of space left.. but then when I try to copy some series.. it says the disc is full and doesn't allow me to copy anything.. I don't know what is happening, I ran virus scans but nothing came up..

Please help..
 
kaisterkai said:
I just don't know what is happening, because my external says (on the side bar of window XP and on prop) that there is still 120GB of space left.. but then when I try to copy some series.. it says the disc is full and doesn't allow me to copy anything.. I don't know what is happening, I ran virus scans but nothing came up..

Please help..
Click to expand...

What file system is on the disk?
 
My guess it's FAT32 and he's trying to copy files over 4gb in size.

@kaisterkai, you can only have a file size of up to 4gb on FAT32.
 
Techrat said:
My guess it's FAT32 and he's trying to copy files over 4gb in size.

@kaisterkai, you can only have a file size of up to 4gb on FAT32.
Click to expand...

Ja, that is most likely the case. That is the error message you get when you try to do that.

Reformat to NTFS. FAT32 is old.
 
but I can copy normal files over..

the files that i'm trying to copy, they're all compressed files.. (I actually realised...)

But as soon as I extracted them, the can copy.. but.. really it's a long process...

the files on the external is just like normal files, like games and software anime etc... I don't know why it's doing that? Does that mean I have to format the thing..
 
What file system is the drive?

And is the stuff you want to copy nested in deep subdirectories with long names?
 
kaisterkai said:
but I can copy normal files over..

the files that i'm trying to copy, they're all compressed files.. (I actually realised...)

But as soon as I extracted them, the can copy.. but.. really it's a long process...

the files on the external is just like normal files, like games and software anime etc... I don't know why it's doing that? Does that mean I have to format the thing..
Click to expand...

what size are the compressed files? And what File System are you using. You have to right click on the drive in Internet Explorer to see what File System the drive is using.
 
The_Librarian said:
What file system is the drive?

And is the stuff you want to copy nested in deep subdirectories with long names?
Click to expand...

I don't understand what you mean.. um.. are you talking about IDE or Sata type thing?

None of them have long names. It's all just the name...
 
Garyvdh said:
what size are the compressed files? And what File System are you using. You have to right click on the drive in Internet Explorer to see what File System the drive is using.
Click to expand...

Its like like about 6-7 GB each..

does the size matter? I mean isn't it just taking longer when trying to copy.. sigh.. akways has problems
 
It's a FAT 32.. so that means I can't copy anything that is bigger than 2GB??? O.O oh no!!!

that is so scary!

sigh... what can I do then? If all the file is compressed I can't copy each file one to another.. T.T

anyone have any ideas?
 
Drive will have to be reformatted to NTFS

Copy everything off the drive.....Format it to NTFS......copy everything back.....add you larger files....all sorted!.... (assuming this is not you primary boot drive)
 
Last edited:
sigh.. but it's an external... so if it's NTFS does that also make the HD faster than the FAT32?
 
Copy everything off the drive.....Format it to NTFS......copy everything back.....add you larger files....all sorted!.... (assuming this is not you primary boot drive)

I do Video work and have very large video files. ..I think NTFS is marginally faster than FAT32......but I think thats just perception.
 
It's not, it's my external.. I was always wondering why it was so slow,,

But thanks hey.. (it's 320Gb.. it's going to take a while to copy everything there.. sigh.. so much to copy.. ><

Thanks anyway ^ ^
 
kaisterkai said:
sigh.. but it's an external... so if it's NTFS does that also make the HD faster than the FAT32?
Click to expand...

Yes and if you accidentally have a unplanned accidental switch off or power failure, your drive is less likely to be screwed up.
I have also noticed that if you just switch off a fat32 drive without closing down on windows the drive slowly gets corrupted and slows down.
Also for large files download a super little freeware app called terracopy.It boosts file transfer speeds significantly.
 
If you get the right programs, you can convert the drive from FAT32 to NTFS without having to copy the data to another drive and formatting. Acronis Disk Director and a few other apps can do this for you.

I don't believe in disk compression either - with the price of HDD's being very low at the moment, I'd suggest rather getting a larger drive than trying to compress it. You're only looking for trouble with that.
 
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