How to find files saved to C: in Windows 7
Microsoft Windows 7 is a massive step forwards after a frustrating Vista Operating System. Microsoft did a very good job of turning around what was wrong with Vista. Unfortunately however there are still a few quirks in Windows 7 that many find very annoying.
Last night I made a backup in iso format. When asked where to save the iso file I selected c: (i.e. root). The file was saved successfully so when I came to find the file on c: I was to find that the file just wasn’t on c:. I tried Windows 7 search, Google Desktop search, a manual search in Explorer as well as a directory search from a command prompt. I just could not find the file! I even tried to create the iso file again and could see the previous iso file on c:. So the file was on the c-drive (root) however no search tools could fnd it!
Well, here is how to find that dissapearing file that you saved to c:
- Open Windows Explorer
- Navigate to c -> Users -><username> ->AppData ->Local -> VirtualStore
- Find your file
The ‘trick’ here is that Windows 7 protects the root and therefore saves any items intended for root (that don’t specifically belong at c:) to the ‘VirtualStore’ folder. So even although you believe that you are saving to c:, you aren’t!
