File names changing; folders showing wrong size

[Sweet-Dreamzzz]

I noticed some of my files have changed and the titles were renamed with strange characters such as (±Å-_æ_.N_p),(ö__¼v_%#.h
:),(_mSñ#t_._qt) etc. When I attempt to delete the entire folders with the strange files inside it says, "Cannot delete access is denied make sure disk is not full or write protected and that file is not currently being used. I try to delete the individual files within the folders and it gives me the error message, "cannot delete file: file system error 1026." When I choose some of the folders individually it reports 0 bytes, 0 files, and 0 folders yet they are there. When trying to delete them I have also gotten the message that the file names were too long. Changing the file names however is impossible it will not let me do that. It has even given me the message that the files don't exist on some of my attempts to delete them. It will not let me drag the files to Drive C or the recycle bin. On the drive D properties it shows used space 124 GB and free space to be 62 GB & 186 Capacity: however some of the folders properties are reporting size to be much larger than it actually is; for instance one folder is reporting to be 2.44TB in size. Some of these folders are backed up which I am thankful for but some are not; does this mean I have lost everything within those folders? When I try to run defrag it says: windows cannot defragment this drive because it appears to be a CD-ROM or network drive, or a drive that was compressed by an unsupported disk-compression program. ID No. Defrag0010. When I try to run ScanDisk it says: ScanDisk cannot check this drive now because the disk is not properly formatted, or a program such as a disk utility has locked it. Format the disk or wait for the utility to finish, and then restart ScanDisk. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[luzchurch]

I had a similar problem and I posted a message to this effect in this section but no one responded with a solution except to suggest that I reformat the drive.
I have been trying to recover the files from this drive for the past two months by typing scandisk at MS DOS prompt and letting the computer run until it asks for directions. Often I have left the unit on all night and by morning some of the problems were corrected. It has now gone through all the folders and is now checking the file system. Don't know when it will finish the process. My HDD is 100GB.
I have found that this is the only way it will work and hope I am able to recover files when the job is finished.
Good luck.

[Nick Grana]

Have you scanned for virus using updated dat files?
Viruses like this (http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.weird.html) are but some of the problems one can have.
Also, problems like yours are common with failing hard drives and the sectors are intermittent and changing.
You can do an online virus scan here (http://housecall.trendmicro.com/).
Good luck.:cool:

[Sweet-Dreamzzz]

Thanks for the advise. Last night I ran adaware and removed several pests; as well I ran Spybot and removed one more. Finally this morning I was able to get ScanDisk to complete on drive c reporting no errors. this took about 3 hours to complete. About 4 weeks ago I had what I think was the blackworm virus. I finally rid myself of that by using the Vundo fix and I reinstalled win98se. during the course of this my drives jumped up a letter. drive c remained the same, but what was once drive e jumped in drive d that is when all the problems began with my now drive d. I am far from being a computer pro but I can usually follow step by step instructions. Again thanks for the responses.