Lost Space

I am having issues getting into safe mode so I used Paragon Drive Backup 10 Pro to restore an image from 2 weeks ago. Well that image didnt fix the issue so I reverted back to my current image. Now Im missing 3Gbs of HD space.

Before the revert back to 2 weeks ago I had 193Gbs free. After going from the 2 week image back to the current image Im at 190Gbs free. Ive went through the both temp folders, appdata, programdata, program files, program files (x86), and have gone through and deleted all the left over program files that are no longer installed and Im still 3Gbs short.

 

It sounds really strage.

Please check if there is hiberfil.sys & pagefile.sys files in C:/. Check their summary size. It looks like they caused the difference in free space on system partition.

Those files are usually excluded from backup, but if you disable 'Skip OS auxiliary files' option, they will be placed in backup and restored.

 

How do I check their size and remove them properly without causing system instability?

EDIT- Checked C drive with showing hidden files and folders enabled. No hiberfil.sys and no pagefile.sys. I did notice my pagefile was set to 6Gbs. I went back through Paragon's archives of backups and did find that the back I restored contained a pagefile.sys of 6Gbs. The old archive that I tried to revert back to also had a pagefile of 6Gbs. That means I still have a loss of 3Gbs somewhere and we have now ruled out the pagefile and hiberfile.

 

Please check backups info:
* run DB 10 Pro
* go to archives tab
* switch to 'Show only partitions' view
* select 2 weeks old backup of C:/ in the list
* In the archive info pane above the list check what Total size & Free space are shown.
Repeat this operation for fresh backup.

If last restored backup has the same free space value as it is now, restore process worked correctly.

 

New one is 2Gbs more compared to the old one and I cant figure out why. When I had the system running before I did the backup it was at 293Gbs free. Now after restoring back its at 290Gbs free. Its at 292Gbs if I change the page file size from what it originally was, if I dont change it and leave it as it was configured Id be short 7Gbs.

 

Any way to compare archives side by side?

 

Unfortunately, not. There is no such option as compare backups .

 

So I suppose I need to sift through archives. Is there a way to export the contents of the archives? Maybe I can export contents each to its own folder and then compare folders with another program.

 

Yes, you can export files from archive by portions via File Transfer wizard.

For more instructions please refer to: http://kb.paragon-software.com/para...atId=2124&objId=6178&statId=1542882&foLang=en

Note: do not restore very large data amounts at once, File Transfer wizard could fail. Restore data by portions ~2GB

 

How do you mount drives for comparison? Can I mount multiple drives?

 

If you have 32-bit Windows, you can mount both archives uder different drive letters.

Then mounted archives could be used for comparison.

Note: special software for comparison could fail to work with mounted archives.

 

So what about on x64? I extracted the files from both backups to their corresponding folder and then used FreeFileSync to compare folders. The issue I had with that is that the Windows folder failed to extract so I cant compare that.

 

I suppose, Windows folder is too large. Try to exctract its content by portions.

(Mount Archive option is not available for 64-bit Windows versions. )