Totally non-plussed by vanishing images ( Win XP )

I was asked to take a look at someone's pc which would boot, but no programs could be run. I noticed that it only had a 30gig HD which was showing 98% full ( * more about that in a minute ), but the software listed couldn't have filled that much of the drive. She admitted though, that she emptied the contents of the camera on to it all the time, so it might be full of images of the kids, dogs, garden and aunties budgerigar ~ that's a shed load of images thinks I.

Here's the weird thing that I can't figure out, when I nosed around inside the system the only image files I could find were ico's. There wasn't a single jpeg, gif, png, bmp, tif... not a single one. Not in the pictures folder, nor in the program folders. It's as if every file of image format had been cleaned out of the machine.

In the end, as there was nothing to attempt to save I just reformatted and did a re-install of XP, but has anyone else ever heard of anything like this happening?

( * The HD? Seems someone else had looked at the machine a while back and gave it the old intake of breath and "you need a bigger hard drive", for which he charged her £120. It's a Dell 3400, and they come with a standard 80gig HD, a lot bigger than the 30 that it has now.
No wonder the case had been closed using pop rivets instead of screws. )

 

Could have been malware. are you certain it's only 30gb? I could have partitioned incorrectly or used an older pre-sp1 version of xp (i think? sp2? though i think the limit would have shown 8gb, it's been a long time since i've run into that issue). Did you do a new partition when reinstalling to be sure?

as for the rivets, dell does that because sometimes the side panel doesnt need to be removed in order to get inside. there's a button on top and the whole side and top lift up kinda like a trunk lid.

 

That was the conclusion I had arrived at thesmokingun, nothing else seems to make sense. But how the heck would it go about doing it?

And yes, it is a 30gig hard drive that's been installed ~ 34 to be precise. I've heard of this happening with memory, but this is the first time I've come across an HD being downgraded on an unsuspecting customer.

 

I think the HD may have a jumper set to the 32gb limit. Which should be unnecessary for that machine if it was usually shipped with an 80gb drive. http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...toid=dacb5b1142aec010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD

Check in my omputer by right clicking the C: drive and selecting Properties. On the Hardware tab it should list the model of HD. Google the model number to find the actual capacity.

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On the pictures, can't tell now, but I wonder if her camera uses a non standard format. I see references to people editing pictures in RAW format. I'm not sure of the actual extension on that type of picture. Maybe it is bmp when they refer to RAW? To be honest I can't off the top of my head tell you what extension my camera uses.

A tool like WinDirStat would help look at a HD and let you know which files are taking up space and where they might be located. Just a thought if she needs help finding pictures in the future.

 

It is a 40 gig drive, I did what you suggested and looked up the serial number, it's a Seagate Barracuda 40gig.
And I've had a look at it with Mini Partition Wizard, and it is showing a hidden 6 gig FAT32 partition ( which contains the Dell backup/restore files ) and the 33.69 gig NTFS partition where everything else is.

I don't know much about her camera, there was some Canon software installed, but I just find it weird that there were no other image files in any folders. Not a single bitmap or gif as part of a GUI, or a jpeg for a logo... absolutely not a one. ???

 

Glad you verified the HD is 40gb. When you said ~34gb I thought it was too close a coincidence to the 32gb limit to ignore.

It is strange absolutely no image files not even logos. I don't know what could have happened to cause that.

 

for raw images, my canon uses .CR2 for the file extension. now since you've reformatted and reinstalled, it's really only speculation now as to why you had those issues. Is everything working fine now?