Monday, February 05, 2007

Recycle Bin Not Another Bottomless Pit

Originally published in the News Press on 02/05/2007.

Recycle Bin Not Another Bottomless Pit.
By: Al Winchell

I believe most know the definition of "assume." Something I must admit I do all too often.

I was made aware of my most recent oversight by a seminar attendee who had taken my advice and purchased an external hard drive for mass storage.

My assumption was that everyone would be aware that a mass deletion of individual data files from an external hard drive has the potential of overwhelming XP's recycle bin.

I'm sure most Good Booters know that because their recycle bin is the court of last resort for restoring inadvertently deleted data, they shouldn't be overly enthusiastic about emptying their recycle bin.

Perhaps they also know when they open their recycle bin if there's a slide bar it's there because Windows is warning them there are data flies hidden from view. And best they be viewed before arbitrarily clicking on "Empty the Recycle Bin."

But perhaps some novices are unaware the recycle bin has limitations.

I. It doesn't collect deletions from a jump drive.

2. If an individual item is larger than the storage capacity of the recycle bin it'll bypass the recycle bin and be permanently deleted.

3. It can be overwhelmed by a mass deletion that exceeds the default setting for the maximum size of the space reserved for deleted items.

It's limitation 3 that caused the emblem experienced by the Good Border who had taken my advice and purchase an external hard drive.

When an external hard drive is connected it's assigned a drive letter and added to the recycle bin "Properties:' But by default it doesn't increase the recycle bin's maximum size of the space reserve for deleted items to compensate for potential deletions from the external hard drive.

Our Good Booter in question is an avid photographer who after sorting and saving the photos she definitely wants to keep, copies the rest to her external hard drive for a periodic final review before deleting them.

Unfortunately when she completed her final review and was ready to delete literally many hundreds of unwanted photos, she clicked Select All >Delete.

The deletion of so much data overwhelmed he, recycle bin causing her system to become unstable and lock up. When she couldn't terminate the deletion process using her task manager, she rebooted via her computer's reset button only to discover that because her external hard drive had been in the process of transferring data when she abruptly reset, "all" the data on it had become inaccessible.

For an in-depth tutorial on everything you should know about your recycle bin go to Newspress.com > Opinion > Belogs > Business > Good Boot.

Here's wishing you a Good Boot.

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