Solved Portable HDD Folders/Files NOT seen in PC.

I have a portable USB2 HDD [general use] that I use for transferring files from one place to another etc.

When I plug this HDD into my TV, I see all the files etc that I expect to see, PLUS, a few files/folders that DON'T appear when the HDD is plugged into my laptop!

I have the following . . .

[1] There is S-1-5-21-4521735, which contains two files, $IRRB8EK.mp4 [file not supported], and $RRRB8EK.mp4 [plays the complete video].
[2] $RR4UFG3.se [cannot read file].
[3] $RNCQ6WT [no suffix and contains 10 files that ALL play].

My question is, how can I get the laptop to see them so I can DELETE them?

I DON'T want any of these files/folders on the HDD.

In the elevated command prompt window they seem to show up in $RECYCLE.BIN in part, although I have performed a Disk Cleanup on the HDD!

All others files/folders are seen on both the TV and laptop as expected!

Thanks in advance!

Paul, is it possible some of those are for the TV to use when working with that Hd?

Hi RolandJS,

RolandJS said:

Paul, is it possible some of those are for the TV to use when working with that HDD?

Click to expand...

Definately NO, but thanks for the suggestion!

I unchecked the Hide protected operating system files temporarily in the Folder Options to allow me to see the $RECYCLE.BIN in the HDD. There are 11 $RECYCLE.BIN folders!

I output everything in the HDD $RECYCLE.BIN folders to a .txt file and ALL the files/folders are definately in the $RECYCLE.BIN.

When I click on each of them, the Empty the Recycle Bin option is greyed out!

I am pretty sure that it is OK to go ahead and delete those folders directly from the HDD Root so I am going to do that!

I went ahead and deleted ALL 11 $RECYCLE.BIN folders. Got mega GB's back. The $RECYCLE.BIN folder gets automatically created anyway when you delete something!

OBSERVATION:

Although running Disk Cleanup on the portable HDD, with the Recycle Bin checked as one of the options available, it appears that it ONLY deletes the FIRST Recycle Bin if there is MORE than 1!

After I deleted ALL 11 $RECYCLE.BIN folders, I re-ran Disk Cleanup and the Recycle Bin showed as EMPTY, which is what was expected!

CONCLUSION:

Running Disk Cleanup ONLY deletes the FIRST Recycle Bin if there is MORE than 1!

I might write a batch script to do this for future use!

I have marked this thread as Solved!