Brink,

Great post on fixing recycle bins. However, my problem slightly different and this did not work.



Running Vista Windows Home Prem, Firefox, Bitdefender, all current. Soon after boot I get error message "Recycle Bin Corrupted (drive letter). Do you want to empty the contents of this bin?" I get the same message for each of my other partitions on two internal drives (4 total). When I open the bin, no contents are displayed.

Following your post, I removed recycle bin folders both of the two ways suggested, using the command prompt for each drive "RD/S/QB:\$Recycle.bin" , and manually finding each recycle bin folder in the operating system and deleting it and the associated desk top ini file.



Sure enough, windows replaced them. The new desktop icon showed an empty basket, and when I dragged the first item to it, it filled with "content". However when I opened the recycle bin, the file was not visible nor would the "restore all" work. I have made sure the option to delete immediately and not move the file to the bin was turned off. Of importance, when I hit the "empty bin" command and got the confirmation dialog, "are you sure you want to permanently delete X number of files?", cancelled, then added another file to the bin, the X number would increase by one. So it seems the file is there but can not be seen nor restored. A few days later I started getting the "Recycle bin corrupt" error message again.

I read about the 2007 vintage recycle bin virus that stores in the recycle bin and regenerates when emptied. I therefore emptied the bins before replacing them as instructed to make sure the virus was deleted along with the bin folder. This is so old I would think my current Bitdefender virus scan would find it.

Ran scan files, full Microsoft Safety Check, Bitdefender scan. Scan files said it found some corrupted files that could not be fixed. I can not understand the log. MSC founld some Javascript corruption which was fixed. The recycle bin problem remains unchanged.


Help appreciated!!!

Brink,

Thanks a lot. When this first happened, I was in no hurry to work it - didn't think it was going to be a big deal. Now problem predates my last restore point, about two weeks ago.

Any other way forward? I dread the idea of reloading windows. Have never done that before, though this being a Dell, there is a recovery backup on the D drive that might make it easier if I find out how it works. Before that, I'd just like to see if there is any other solution.

Do you think spending some bucks with Geek Squad or other resource could do any good?

Thanks again.

Fellow Texan, TCBiker.

Thanks Englishman!

Interesting. When I first created a new user account and opened it, I swear I saw an empty recycle bin on the desktop. I went to a program to create a trail document to delete and when I came back, the recycle bin was gone. I used personalization to recreate one and deleted my trial document. The empty bin icon changed to the full icon, but when I opened the bin, it showed nothing. When I commanded empty, confirmation dialog said "are you sure you want to delete this item", so my trail was marked for deletion.

Looks to me like I have a virus but checking Bitdefender, McAfee sites, see no mention of one nor does Googling "recycle bin corrupt" produce any current results.

I bought an external hard drive today to backup files in the event I have to reload the operating system. However, having seen what happened just now, I am afraid to connect it as I think it will pick up the virus and reinfect me again after the reload. I'm even afraid my thumb drives could be corrupted.

Interesting also, I found a new user account, named Ne. I don't remember creating it nor would I use such a name. I deleted it and any and all associated files.

What do you think? Where would you go from here? Brink, any ideas?

Thanks guys!

TCBiker

Brink,

I am ready to reload Vista. However, my question is, since this affected the recycle bins on both internal hard drives, I thought I'd have to reformat the second hard drive at the same time. If I hook up an external to copy backup data, I think it will get infected too and, when I come back on line, I have three hard drives in trouble. Do you agree?

Ideas?