Windows 10 PC wont let me copy files to other media

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Oct 31, 2017
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Windows 10 Pro, Dell Optiplex 3050, up to date. Windows Defender and Avast have not found any bugs.

When I copy a folder to either an external hard drive, USB memory stick, or SD card, the following happens:

1. The copied folder shows up on the external drive, USB memory stick, or SD card,, but it tends to contain only some of the files from the original folder and most of the subfolders are empty.

2. The copied files may at first appear present, but after ejecting the external hard drive, USB memory stick, or SD card, the files may disappears from either the copied main folder and/or the subfolders.

In other words, I copy a folder containing files and subfolders to external drive/storage. Neither files nor folder content remain on any external drive/storage after ejecting the medium. The copied folder and subfolder are empty.

I have never before encountered this madness.

Any ideas?
 
Maybe run chkdsk on your USB drive, to see if the filesystem is okay?

If you don't care and don't need anything currently on it you could just reformat it and try the copy again.
 
Maybe run chkdsk on your USB drive, to see if the filesystem is okay?

If you don't care and don't need anything currently on it you could just reformat it and try the copy again.
C:\WINDOWS\system32>chkdsk E:/f
The type of the file system is exFAT.
Volume Serial Number is _____________
Windows is verifying files and folders...
Corruption was found while examining the volume bitmap.
File and folder verification is complete.

Windows has made corrections to the file system.
No further action is required.

524270592 KB total disk space.
82081152 KB in 1551 files.
12032 KB in 94 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
640 KB in use by the system.
442176768 KB available on disk.

131072 bytes in each allocation unit.
4095864 total allocation units on disk.
3454506 allocation units available on disk.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>
 
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Are the files or some of them hidden or system files or read only, if they are maybe try changing the property of the folder and all files so they are not. Also could try command line copy/paste
 
Are the files or some of them hidden or system files or read only, if they are maybe try changing the property of the folder and all files so they are not. Also could try command line copy/paste
I tried that already. I think I'll have one of our techies have a look at it. It's not important. There are no really important files on that PC and I do have backups. Just an odd thing to happen.
 
I've seen a forensic write blocker work like that. Files and folders look like they've been written, but they really aren't.

That's very unlikely to be the issue here. Only other thing I could think of is: after you write the files and folders, do you do an eject of the USB drive via the lower-right corner icon? Or, do you just pull it out of the machine?
 
I've seen a forensic write blocker work like that. Files and folders look like they've been written, but they really aren't.

That's very unlikely to be the issue here. Only other thing I could think of is: after you write the files and folders, do you do an eject of the USB drive via the lower-right corner icon? Or, do you just pull it out of the machine?
Nope, no forensic write blocker. I eject via Safely Remove in the tray before I remove any drive. It's not a common or easily solved problem. It shall be solved within a few days. It's not urgent.
 
Is it a personal or Corp PC? If Corp, do they use any type of management suites or Group Policy the PC may be getting preventing copying to external media?
 
Is it a personal or Corp PC? If Corp, do they use any type of management suites or Group Policy the PC may be getting preventing copying to external media?
Corp PC. Never had a problem copying to external media. I'll have it checked out first thing next week.
 
These are files I had already backed up without any problem. I could copy the backup files.
When you backup, did you copy to removeable media or encrypted disk inside the corp laptop ? Did the backup use the same file format ? Sometimes DLP policy may have different policy based on the destination and the file format, e.g. actual .ppt compared to encrypted zip.
 
When you backup, did you copy to removeable media or encrypted disk inside the corp laptop ? Did the backup use the same file format ? Sometimes DLP policy may have different policy based on the destination and the file format, e.g. actual .ppt compared to encrypted zip.
I backed up to an external drive. Same format. I'm not having any problems with my encrypted disk.
 
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