Huge unexplained increase in Backup size
My latest Full backup of my OS drive was 196 GB; all the previous Full backups were only 89 GB.
I ran the Full because one day before an Incremental (atop on 89 GB Full) inexplicably was 107GB; I stupidly deleted in; I wish I hadn't because it's contents could explain what's happened here. I was guessing I'd mistakenly defragged the drive.
Before the latest Full I ran Windows' Disk Cleanup (which only found a couple GB of junk I deleted). They I did run a defrag before the Full because in the past I've found this can deal with improperly enlarged swap/page files.
But the Full was still a hugely increased 196 GB. (I keep most data on separate drives.)
I mounted the new too-large Full and nothing stands out to explain it. The Backup settings look right. About all I can think of to do would be to delete/re-create the backup, but it does seem like SOMEHOW there's more on the OS drive (please see attached JPG comparing the usage of the OS drive and it' mounted Full backup). I've also printscreened recent backup Activity for the OS drive from the GUI.
Apart from my not understanding why my C drive now uses 176 GB, why does a Full of it (which excludes all the default stuff) use 213 GB?
See also forum topic: Unknown cause of increase in used disk space where another user hit a similar issue recently.
Short answer: you solved it Steve, thank you very much!
I apologize for not mentioning that when I wrote "The Backup settings look right" I should have mentioned that the first thing I did was make sure that "sector-by-sector mode" wasn't on. I didn't know that could be triggered, but MVP Log Viewer showed it wasn't.
I've never before found Treesize utilities useful but this time it, and your solution in that other thread, did the trick.
I use an alternate to the (Win8.1) File Explorer. I use FreeCommander because it is configurable to show Folder Sizes (in addition to file sizes). And everything there looked the same as always, and DID NOT add up to the 176 GB that the drive was using.
When I first saw your solution to the other thread I wasn't hopeful, since I've had System Restore disabled for decades (because I found that it not infrequently restores and corrupts simultaneously, and because I've always made daily incrementals).
But then I noticed that while the Win8.1 File Explorer *and* FreeCommander (despite both being set to hide nothing) lied to me that System Volume Information was empty, Treesize correctly revealed (perhaps only because I ran it as Admin?) that System Volume Information contained 69 GB of it's worthless restore points.
It appears my System Restore mysteriously turned itself on (perhaps a Windows Update did this) just this month. So I turned that lame utility off and deleted all it's restore points, and now my C drive is back to containing the usual 108 GB!
If I didn't already hate System Restore...now that it on without my permission I hate it even more.
Success!
Always glad to read success stories and happy to have been able to help! Thanks for the feedback.
Wait. Reading past farther into that other thread called my attention to:
Why did this even matter since of course System Volume Information is in my backup's exclusion list too.
Since I don't use System Restore the issue might be moot for me, but I'll now proceed to check for errors (filesystem errors w/chkdsk, physical errors with HD Tune), then I'll try cloning the task. I'll report results.
Perhaps (as I read in the other excellent threads) the System Restore points, and the backup ignoring the Exclusion list and including them, was due errors. But the drive errors were minor filesystem ones:
CHKDSK c: /f
"251 unused index entries..."
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the master file table (MFT) bitmap.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the volume bitmap.
Windows has made corrections to the file system.
No further action is required."
Repeat CHKDSK was clean.
No errors on physical media scan by HD Tune (which reports errors other HDD diagnostics won't).
Now I'll clone the backup and reset to initial settings in hopes the Exclusions work then. Though since there will be no System Restore points to back up, I'll likely never know.
p.s. While the word "sector" doesn't appear in the log of the huge backup, I wonder if anything else in it was amiss (p.s repsetting to initial settings did add a bunch of Exclusions, though System Volume Information was already there):
| 2018-08-23T20:38:47:882-08:00 4372 I00640000: Backup reserve copy attributes: format tib; need_reserve_backup_copy false; 2018-08-23T20:38:47:882-08:00 4372 I00640002: Operation C started manually. 2018-08-23T20:38:51:272-08:00 4372 I00640000: Backup reserve copy attributes: format tib; need_reserve_backup_copy false; 2018-08-23T20:38:51:272-08:00 4372 I013C0000: Operation: Backup 2018-08-23T20:38:51:272-08:00 4372 I0064000B: Priority changed to Low. 2018-08-23T20:38:51:678-08:00 4372 I000B03F0: Create Backup Archive Password Protected From: Disk 1 To file: G:\ati\C.tib Compression: Normal Exclude: Files matching mask Match criterion: hiberfil.sys, pagefile.sys, $Recycle.Bin, swapfile.sys, System Volume Information, *.tib, *.tib.metadata, *.~, *.tmp, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Opera Software, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Opera Software, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Opera Software, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles, C:\WINDOWS\CSC 2018-08-23T20:38:52:085-08:00 4372 I000101F8: Pending operation 173 started: 'Creating partition image'. 2018-08-23T20:46:26:164-08:00 2628 I00640000: Writing full version to file: C_full_b2_s1_v1-2.tib 2018-08-23T22:42:04:032-08:00 4372 I000101F8: Pending operation 173 started: 'Creating partition image'. 2018-08-23T22:42:04:391-08:00 4372 I00640000: The following backups have been successfully created: G:\ati\C_full_b2_s1_v1-2.tib 2018-08-23T22:42:06:673-08:00 4372 I000B0402: Validate Backup Archive Location: G:\ati\C_full_b2_s1_v1-2.tib 2018-08-23T22:42:06:673-08:00 4372 I000101F8: Pending operation 4 started: 'Validate Backup Archive'. 2018-08-23T23:33:33:181-08:00 4372 I013C0006: Shutdown attempt(by scheduler) 2018-08-23T23:33:33:196-08:00 4372 I013C0006: Shutdown success 2018-08-23T23:33:33:509-08:00 4372 I013C0006: Operation has succeeded. Start: 8/23/2018 8:38:47 PM |
The initial CHKDSK free space marked as allocated in the MFT error could be the trigger here plus in the log from Aug 23rd you have a file name C_full_b2_s1_v1-2.tib where -2 indicates another file of the same name was encountered.
Have you run this backup again since correcting the free space error?
I forget why the "-2" happened.
Yes I have run this backup again, and it went perfectly (thank you Steve!):
2018-08-24T17:47:36:261-08:00 3440 I00640000: Backup reserve copy attributes: format tib; need_reserve_backup_copy false;
2018-08-24T17:47:36:276-08:00 3440 I00640002: Operation C started manually.
2018-08-24T17:47:39:276-08:00 3440 I00640000: Backup reserve copy attributes: format tib; need_reserve_backup_copy false;
2018-08-24T17:47:39:276-08:00 3440 I013C0000: Operation: Backup
2018-08-24T17:47:39:276-08:00 3440 I0064000B: Priority changed to Low.
2018-08-24T17:47:39:433-08:00 3440 I000B03F0: Create Backup Archive Password Protected From: Disk 1 To file: G:\ati\C.tib Compression: Normal Exclude: Files matching mask Match criterion: hiberfil.sys, pagefile.sys, $Recycle.Bin, swapfile.sys, System Volume Information, *.tib, *.tib.metadata, *.~, *.tmp, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Temp, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\cache2, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\OfflineCache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Cache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Media Cache, C:\Users\Bill\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\cache2, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\OfflineCache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Cache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Media Cache, C:\Users\UpdatusUser\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\cache2, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\*\OfflineCache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Cache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Opera Software\Opera Stable\Media Cache, C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache, C:\WINDOWS\CSC, C:\Users\Bill\OneDrive
2018-08-24T17:47:39:870-08:00 3440 I000101F8: Pending operation 173 started: 'Creating partition image'.
2018-08-24T17:52:35:818-08:00 5684 I00640000: Writing full version to file: C_full_b1_s1_v1-2.tib
2018-08-24T18:44:56:835-08:00 3440 I000101F8: Pending operation 173 started: 'Creating partition image'.
2018-08-24T18:44:57:148-08:00 3440 I00640000: The following backups have been successfully created: G:\ati\C_full_b1_s1_v1-2.tib
2018-08-24T18:44:57:726-08:00 3440 I000B0402: Validate Backup Archive Location: G:\ati\C_full_b1_s1_v1-2.tib
2018-08-24T18:44:57:742-08:00 3440 I000101F8: Pending operation 4 started: 'Validate Backup Archive'.
2018-08-24T19:07:58:261-08:00 3440 I013C0006: Shutdown attempt(by scheduler)
2018-08-24T19:07:58:276-08:00 3440 I013C0006: Shutdown success
2018-08-24T19:07:58:448-08:00 3440 I013C0006: Operation has succeeded.
Start: 8/24/2018 5:47:36 PM
Stop: 8/24/2018 7:07:58 PM
Total Time: 01:20:22
Good to hear!