Laptop Hard Drive won’t update space available – Fixed

I’ve shredded a bunch of large files recently (old tutorial clips from youtube and some important documents) but the free space bar on My Computer isn’t updating the free space at all. Is there a problem or does it just take a long time for that free space bar to update when deleting and shredding large files?
HD model: Western Digital Scorpio Black Edition
Answer #1
Maybe the deleted files are moved to the recycle bin..
Answer #2
Maybe the deleted files are moved to the recycle bin..Nope! I shredded the files from my recycle bin as well. I just did a test earlier and removed a 2gb clip and it’s still stuck at the same amount. :/
Answer #3
I assume the files you delete were on that drive? I know I’ve had the occasional brain fart looking at one drive’s stats when the files were on another one.
You mention “shredded”. What app did you use? Not that I’ve seen this recently, but when you delete a file, a flag is set on the header to say “deleted”; there is another flag to say “space available”. Before everyone jumps in, I know this is the children’s digest explanation. Maybe the shredding app you used didn’t say “space available”.
Whatever the case, opening a command prompt and doing a chkdsk will find any problems with the file system and indexes and correct them.
PS: I know you said laptop, but I have 3 drives in mine so not quite the silly question it may seem to be.
Answer #4
I assume the files you delete were on that drive? I know I've had the occasional brain fart looking at one drive's stats when the files were on another one.
You mention "shredded". What app did you use? Not that I've seen this recently, but when you delete a file, a flag is set on the header to say "deleted"; there is another flag to say "space available". Before everyone jumps in, I know this is the children's digest explanation. Maybe the shredding app you used didn't say "space available".
Whatever the case, opening a command prompt and doing a chkdsk will find any problems with the file system and indexes and correct them.
I used this program called Eraser for clearing up the stuff in my recycle bin.
https://safelinking.net/p/a7b9c4295f
It has happened before but the space freed up from deletion/shredding appeared after 10minutes or so. I’ll do a chkdsk in a bit and see how things go.
Answer #5
Eraser has bugs and there hasn’t been an update in 2 years (or a year if you look at the nightly builds). I followed this app a few years back and the developer has a tendency to keep updating while never really fixing the bugs.
Disk utilities really don’t need to be updated if they work!
Try:
http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=Microsoft/BlankAndSecure
Free and portable.
Answer #6
Thanks for the recommendation. I’ve removed Eraser and did a ChkDsk earlier but sadly the space free from all the file deletion and shredding isn’t showing up still.
Answer #7
Then the files must still be there. Try doing a “disk cleanup”. Sometimes the recycle bin becomes corrupt and the files remain (often in an old recycle bin as windows creates a new one if there is a corruption).
EDIT: in case you forgot how to get there, Open Disk Cleanup by clicking the Start button Picture of the Start button, clicking All Programs, clicking Accessories, clicking System Tools, and then clicking Disk Cleanup.
Answer #8
Then the files must still be there. Try doing a "disk cleanup". Sometimes the recycle bin becomes corrupt and the files remain (often in an old recycle bin as windows creates a new one if there is a corruption).
EDIT: in case you forgot how to get there, Open Disk Cleanup by clicking the Start button Picture of the Start button, clicking All Programs, clicking Accessories, clicking System Tools, and then clicking Disk Cleanup.Thanks! Your Disk Clean Up idea actually fixed it I did a clean up of ‘System Restore and Shadow Copies’ and I got the space back!