Sync Error with offline files of mapped network drive involving recycle.bin
If this is not the correct place to ask this, can you direct me?Windows 7 ultimate x64, I have a drive of one computer mapped to another computer as a network drive and made it available offline. It is not the 'c:' drive of the computer it resides in. It is a data storage drive.When I sync, about 85% of it syncs, then I get 21 errors involving '$Recycle.Bin'. Then a sync failed notice.One of the biggest data folders does not complete synchronization.The drive is a 250Gb drive about 1/3 full.Can I exclude the 'Recycle bin' from the sync process?If that is not possible can I remove the Recycle bin from the drive that is being mapped? If it's necessary to remove the recycle bin from the mapped bin, can files deleted from it still be recycled throught the recycle bin on the OS 'C:' drive?Thank you.
November 1st, 2009 6:36pm

I worked on this for several hours yesterday. I couldn't find an answer, but thought that the problem had something to do with trying to make a folder, or in this case a mapped drive, which contained a 'system file' (recycle bin) available offline.Doing so seemed to break the sync process, interrupting it before the sync was complete, not just generating error messages.So I decided to back track and remove the 'tick' from the menu 'always available offline'. Well I did that and it resulted in a long (about 30 minute) sync process which generated about 30 errors in the sync center window, most seemed to involve recycle bin or files which had changed in the original data folder, then windows 7 x64 becoming unresponsive for a period of 20 minutes. I ended this by restarting the computer and the boot process informed me that windows had encountered an error and how did I want to proceed. I chose 'Start Windows Normally'.Onced I loggedback into windows Iformatted the csc cache using a registry command. I worked around the problem by unmapping the network drive and simply mapping one folder on the drive, which I placed all the data folders into on the other computer. That way I could have all the data available without having the recycle bin in the same location, it continued to reside on the drive, outside the folder. Then I made the folder 'always available offline' and the sync process now seems to work.Regardless, there seems to be something broken in the way 'offline folders' works.I can sum it up as follows: Mapping a network hard drive and making it available as an 'offline folder' results in a critical sync error if there is a recycle bin on that hard drive. Then making that 'offline folder' NOT available offline results in what seems to be a strangely long 'sync' process (why wouldn't it be almost instantaneous?), then makes windows 7 unresponsive, requiring a power reset.
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November 2nd, 2009 4:40pm

Can someone from Microsoft/Technet please comment on this?
November 12th, 2009 12:52am

Hi Stephen, Can you tell me what registry command you used to format the csc cache? I'm having problems getting rid of my offline files. they synced partially once and then failed and now trying to get rid of them (select all and remove the "always available offline" option and re-running sync) got rid of about 21 of 22GB of offline files but some seem stuck in limbo. They don't have the always available offline option selected anymore but the status still says available offline. Maybe that registry command can help purge my last 1.5GB of wasted space... Thanks!
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November 24th, 2009 6:29pm

Whitik,I put this in a .bat file and ran it. (I think you can also manually enter it into the registry)REG ADD "HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\CSC\Parameters" /v FormatDatabase /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /fThe Reboot. All the content of the cache will be deleted. The key will delete itself.**The above is all you need to reset the CSC**I don't have the post where I found this info bookmarked on this computer, but it was the first step in moving the cache to a different drive.The next step (to move the cache off of the C: drive) is:HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\CSC\ParametersType: REG SZ (string)Name: CacheLocationValue: the new location in NT format, ie \??\d:\csc if you want to create the new cache in d:\cscThen create the folder in the new locationThen RebootIt worked for me to move the cache to a different drive, my C: was fast but small, and couldn't contain a big enough CSC.Where it says \??\d:\csc take that literally, the two question marks are required as such. You can change the d:\csc to what you want.Can someone please comment about the issue I asked about in my original posts? Is that behavior a feature or a bug?
November 24th, 2009 7:58pm

I have struggled for days now trying to avoid this kind of problems with Windows 7 and a NAS. Today I spent 2.5h with a support guy at QNAP (my NAS provider), and the poor guy finally admitted there is a problem with Wiindows 7 and offline folders on SAMBA based NAS. I think quite many people are working on this now since not only QNAP has this problem. I think this goes for every NAS provider more or less, since almost all of them are SAMBA based....
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November 30th, 2009 2:47pm

I did try using a network drive attached to a linksys router. I got a lot of errors and gave up in a few hours. Now I'm just using a windows 7 computer as thehost for my offline files. The workaround I discussed in the first two posts has been satisfactory for several weeks, no errors, as long as I don't make the 'entire' drive available to other computers 'offline'. I wish a moderator or someone from Technet/Microsoft would comment on this matter. I don't want to think its 'hush-hush'. I see what seem to be a lot more trivial matters addressed very quickly, but this topic is a month old.
December 1st, 2009 7:29pm

I agree, a comment from Microsoft would be valuable. I think it is a better strategy to openly admit there are problems with offline folders with Samba based servers. Just stating Samba servers are not a supported solution will not give them any credit. With the amount of Samba based NAS devices out there today together with the new library function in Windows that automatically turns on off line folders as soon as you include a directory on the NAS, it will not take long before this fires back at Microsoft. Everything worked fine with Vista and in Windows 7 something has been changed causing this problem. I'm not stating it is a fault in Windows 7. It's more an interworking issue that must be solved asap.
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December 1st, 2009 8:40pm

I agree, 2 laptop windows XP works fine and 2 laptop windows 7 don't work with offline files on a QNAP NAS.
December 2nd, 2009 8:42pm

Will the presence of System Files in the folder being mapped and made available offline on anther computer, such as 'System Volume Information', $Recycle.Bin, etc. generated errors in the Sync Center during the synchronization process?
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December 11th, 2009 10:37pm

I have sync problems even with "normal" files, i.e. not only with system files. Once I open a file on the NAS for instance in EXCEL, I can notice the original file is deleted on the NAS (I can monitor this by using the NAS Web based file manager) and is replaced by a few tmp files. Saving the EXCEL file results in a copy in the offline folder on my Windows 7 client. The file is not written back to the NAS and the file is consequently marked "Needs sync" in Windows. However, the file is never synced, and if I force a sync operation I get a sync conflict message stating the file has been deleted on the server. I can resolve the sync issue by a forced copy of the local file to the server, but I have to do this for every file I update on the Windows 7 client, and of course this is not the way it should work. This problem is extremely annoying and I can't find any help with this, neither from Microsoft nor from QNAP (the NAS manufacturer). The question is if anyone has managed to get offline folders work with Windows 7 (64bit) and a SAMBA v3.4.2 based server? AN UPDATE: I think I have discovered something! My problems seems to be related to Office 2007 files! I have no problems to update simple text files with notepad for instance. They are immediately written back to the server and is automatically in sync. It looks like Office 2007 change the way files are accessed, and this seems to create problems with the SAMBA server. I tested to update an old EXCEL file in compatibility mode ( the old file format) and this worked without any problem as well! I guess it's a file locking problem I have run into. I upgraded to Office 2007 at the same time as I upgraded to Windows 7 and I to quick concluded the problem was related to the Windows 7 upgrade. I guess the problems with system files people have seen also are related to file locking issues. Hopefully I can find some guidance to change the SAMBA configuration to solve this issue.
December 23rd, 2009 8:57am

I checked how Office 2007 worked in a Windows 7 environment.Shared folder in a drive on a Windows 7 ultimate system.That folder is mapped to a second Windows 7 ultimate system, and made available via 'Offline files' managed with 'Sync Center'.I saved a Word .docx file and an Excel .xlsx file in the folder on the first system.They were immediately available on the second system.I modified them on the second system and saved.I ran a Sync which completed quickly with no reported errors.I modified them on the second system again, saved them, did NOT run Sync a second time.Went back to the first system and checked the files.They were correctly saved on the first system.Points: This is not a NAS, the folder and drive are resident on a Windows 7 computer. This is not SAMBA, (which is evidently a Unix tool). This is strictly a Windows 7 environment.First Impression: Office 7 appears to be working correctly in regards to Offline Files in a Windows 7 environment.Suggested Workaround: Switch from Unix to Windows 7. : )I don't know anything about Unix or Samba. Is Office 2007 supposed to run on Unix? 2007 Microsoft Office system requirements Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007 ComponentRequirement Computer and processor 500 megahertz (MHz) processor or higher <sup>1</sup> Memory 256 megabyte (MB) RAM or higher<sup>1, 2, 3</sup> Hard disk 3 gigabyte (GB); a portion of this disk space will be freed after installation if the original download package is removed from the hard drive. Drive DVD drive Display 1024x768 or higher resolution monitor Operating system Microsoft Windows XP with Service Pack (SP) 2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, or later operating system<sup>4</sup>
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December 24th, 2009 5:53pm

I agree, a comment from Microsoft would be valuable. I think it is a better strategy to openly admit there are problems with offline folders with Samba based servers. Just stating Samba servers are not a supported solution will not give them any credit. With the amount of Samba based NAS devices out there today together with the new library function in Windows that automatically turns on off line folders as soon as you include a directory on the NAS, it will not take long before this fires back at Microsoft.Everything worked fine with Vista and in Windows 7 something has been changed causing this problem. I'm not stating it is a fault in Windows 7. It's more an interworking issue that must be solved asap. I followed the guidance in this older article about Vista and it resolved my Win7 sync issues to my samba-based NAS.http://blogs.technet.com/filecab/archive/2007/03/16/using-offline-files-with-samba-emc-servers-nas-devices.aspx
December 24th, 2009 6:29pm

Reminder File-level based storage on non-Windows devices is not supported by Microsoft. Only devices that have been qualified by the Windows Hardware Qualification Laboratory under the Server category are supported by Microsoft for file-based storage. While Microsoft can enable this deployment, the support is assumed 100% by the hardware device vendor in the case of non-Windows devicesGood luck.Does it seem weird, remarkable, notable, or otherwise outstanding that no one from the moderator/Microsoft team has commented in this thread? The topic's almost two months old. Maybe it's just boring, redundant, or answered elsewhere, but how about a 'Hi' guys?
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December 24th, 2009 10:19pm

I know this thread is a little more than a month old, but here is a link I found for this issue for the benefit of those who are still searching for a solution. There is an answer to this problem as provided by a MS Support Moderator: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7network/thread/640ddb56-3059-4fe6-91cf-e2d60e06ea28 And another one... http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/w7itprogeneral/thread/d86e75e8-55ab-4443-a76f-1af2978f0e74 Hope that helps...
February 3rd, 2010 1:47am

Hi Scotte,Thanks for trying to help.This thread is a little over 3 months old. : )I think I saw the first thread before, and it may apply to this situation, about mapped network drives not working offline because they contain recycler. My workaround, simply not making the whole drive available offline is working well for over two months now. Not sure if that oplocks registry setting would avoid the problems I was having or not. (if I tried to make the whole network drive available offline.) May try it sometime.I was aware of the second thread which you can see I posted in several times.
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February 3rd, 2010 8:03pm

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