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Thread: help! theres a wierd folder on my drive, dont think it's a virus but i need advice!

  1. #1
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    help! theres a wierd folder on my drive, dont think it's a virus but i need advice!

    this is my story, yesterday my 10 GB HDD crashed and failed so I send it to the shop where i bought it for repairs and warranty and they said I will be able to get it after 7 days, so what i did is get my old 540 MB harddisk drive and use it, first i didnt formated it and just delete the files there then after that i installed my operating system (windows 98 second edition) after all that when I browsed on my directory i found a folder named "Wininst0.400" then opened it and found lots of wierd files i.e. [0015.9e2, Ios\*pnp.050, Ss = reb.oot.OOT stuff, then I looked on the properties of the folder and I was shocked to see the size of the folder, it WAS 9.28 TB (9.28 TerraByte) then I tried deleting it it says "folder doesnt exist" or "Cannot delete: YS [001.59D: The filename you specify is invalid and too long" then I tried deleting one by one but still a message saying "File system error"
    Now I was left for my last resort by formating the whole drive, after I formated it and reinstalled windows and browsed the folder "Wininst0.400" is still there cant get rid of it, I tried an antivirus software specifically McAfee and Norton but when they start scanning it the antivirus just goes "illegal operation" and cant scan it anymore, I need help here what is folder "Wininst0.400" all about

  2. #2
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    I put that file in a search engine and got back a few websites. It seems that you need this file when your installing Win95 and Win98. Put the file through a search engine and see for yourself.

  3. #3
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    The drive may have been compressed with DriveSpace, DoubleSpace, or a third-party utility.

  4. #4
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    Wininst0.400 is a temporary directory and the Windows Install copies Mini.cab to it. Mini.cab contains the mini-Windows program files required by Setup. Setup also extracts Precopy1.cab and Precopy2.cab to this folder

    Normally, this directory, being temporary, will get deleted when the win98 install does it's cleanup.

    Generally, if this file is still there, it could indicated a bad install.

    If the os is working properly, you may want to try and delete this directory through DOS. ( A true dos prompt, not Windows dos)
    You may have to stip attributes from the folder.

    If the OS is not working properly or some things are missing, you may want to redo a reinstall. start with the fdisk, then format then install.

    not much..

    good luck
    Last edited by stylin19; 02-10-2002 at 04:54 PM.

  5. #5
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    Run a scandisk on the drive. The FAT table was messed up if its reporting files that size. Then you should be able to delete the folder.

    (You might also want to run a through scan since its an old hard drive - you might have bad sectors)

    - Escyld

  6. #6
    Senior Member userserver's Avatar
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    If you Defrag (with thorough surface scan) the file will go away or at worst, you will be able to delete the directory.

  7. #7
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    I've had this several times, I just deleted any files in it and left the directory. All my attempts to get rid of it failed. It didn't do any harm, it was just a little irritating.

  8. #8
    Senior Member userserver's Avatar
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    Does it have any files in it, now that you have deleted them? When do new files appear and what type are they?

    Were you using any tweaking applications before this appeared the first time?

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