$Extend Folder Windows 10

[roger_hawke]

Gus, Bruce, Rustys,

Apologies for bringing this up again.

I have discussed the $Extend folder with you before.
The concensus of opinion was to either ignore it, or do a re-install of Win 10.

I last did a re-install of Win 10 in February 2020 and everything with this folder has been fine since then. (The folder had a fairly constant size of 20.1mb).

About two weeks ago I had reason to do a Restore operation (which didn’t change anything) so I undid the Restore operation.
It was after carrying out these operations that I noticed the $Extend had grown to 6.8gb. (It has not got any bigger since)

Could the carrying out of Restore/Undo Restore have caused this?
Any ideas why?

Just curious.

[veeg]

Hello

Hopefully they will chime in soon..

@Bruce @Rustys

[Bruce]

if it was small before the Restore and then grew larger after the Restore, then Yes, there must be a connection there somewhere.

$Extend is one of those ones, like WinSxS, where everyone has there own opinion, but there’s no official word from MS.
and why - because they don’t want you to touch it. even with Show Hidden Files turned on, you can’t see it.

only with 3rd party, specialised programs does it show up, like 7zip File Manager or WizTree.
it’s like $MFT, or $Boot, or $BadClus - you aren’t meant to see it or touch it, leave it alone and MS will take care of it as, and when, needed.

[veeg]

Any updates?

[roger_hawke]

Bruce/Veeg

Understand your comments.
What I don’t understand is what is the point of the folder?
You can’t open it, you can’t see it and you can’t delete it.
I only see it because I use Wiztree.
If I didn’t use Wiztree I would still be wondering where the additional 6.8gb was being used.

[veeg]

OK…

@Bastet @Bruce

[Bastet]

It seems it is a reserved folder for system settings. I would leave it alone.

[Rustys]

https://pchelpforum.net/t/extend-folder-windows-10.44431/#post-82615

https://pchelpforum.net/t/what-is-extend-folder-windows-10.41692/

[Bruce]

found a bit of info here; https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-Ex...indows?share=1
but as you probably have discovered yourself with your own Google searching, there is no definitive answer, only speculation.
honestly, unless drive space is getting critical, you’re going to have to ignore it and move on.

[roger_hawke]

Rustys,

Apologies for bringing this up again (3rd. time), but what I was really hoping for was that the apparent connection between Restore/Undo Restore operations
and $Extend folder could be explained.

As you all know there is not an awful lot of useful information about this folder out there.

[Rustys]

To answer your question yes it did grow in size because of the restore and the undo of the restore.

See if this helps to explain it better.

https://topic.alibabacloud.com/a/c-extend-whats-this-folder_1_31_10198173.html

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/d74e11db-d2be-481e-b879-d1e2376cd29f/access-extend-folder-via-file-explorer?forum=w7itprogeneral

https://superuser.com/questions/1120554/system-and-reserved-folder-550gb-win-10

[roger_hawke]

Veeg/Bruce/Bastet/Rustys,

Sincere thanks for all your assistance on this matter.

I think the best thing to do is live with it unless it starts growing and growing. (If it does I will probably do a clean install of Win 10).

I will avoid Restore/Undo Restore if possible.

One last question - is the file likely to get smaller over time?

[Bruce]

you would think that it must eventually hit a trigger, be it size or age, where Window’s own maintenance regime would kick in and clean it up.

My folder is at 20.1MB which seems to be the norm until whatever gets it to grow is done; Restore, updates whatever.

I have always had system restores turned off, hibernation turned off, pagefile not on C:, and all that sort of stuff, so i wonder if mine is ‘normal’ because of that.

[roger_hawke]

Thanks Bruce

My folder was always 20.1mb until I carried out the restore/undo restore operations.
I think we might as well knock this one on the head - please mark as solved (sort of!!)
I’ ll try not to raise this issue again.

Always a pleasure dealing with you all.

Cheers