Recycle Bin rendered inoperable

[artz]

My Recycle Bin (Windows 10) is inoperable because of thousands upon thousands of files like in the attached. I have tried multiple approaches to emptying (all at once, selecting a few at a time etc.) but there are literally so many of these that I have not found a method to get my Recycle Bin back and operating. Any suggestions on to get these emptied out and how to prevent future overloading of the Bin? Thanks.

Screenshot 2023-08-06 175254.png (332.41 KiB) Viewed 1008 times

[Zenju]

You could open FreeFileSync with admin rights, select only one folder, "C:\$Recycle.Bin", and manually delete all the items. ("permanently", of course)

[artz]

Thanks. My computer skills may be lacking to execute on this. I ran as administrator, but only arrived at the same main FreeFileSync screen. I did a search for C:\$Recycle.Bin but that came up empty, even though there were thousands of files out there. I had set reports to go to my D drive (where I keep data), changing to 30 days max, but that still overwhelms the Recycle Bin and Empty Recycle Bin no longer worked when overwhelmed. So, what I ended up doing is selecting 150 or so files at a time and deleting them in batches from the Recycle Bin. I don't know if I will have to Empty frequently to avoid the bin getting overloaded. Or maybe there is a way to limit how many files go in there and/or a setting to automatically delete outside that range?

[therube]

150 or so files at a time

Why 150?
Can't you select them all, Ctrl+A (to select them all, then Shift+DEL to delete them)?

[xCSxXenon]

Just right-click the Recycle Bin icon and empty it, no need to go inside it first. If that isn't working, there is something wrong with your OS or the drive itself

[artz]

Thanks. Prior to the FreeFileSync files, I was able to delete all at one time (including lots of 4k video and other large files). The problem started once the FreeFile Sync files started appearing. When I would try deleting all, it would search forever and never finish, no matter which method was used to select. That is why I experimented with a smaller batch. That was the only way I could eventually empty out the recycle bin?

[artz]

P.S. after emptying the recycle bin, I ran a synch (also have the batches set up), and got the message?

Screenshot 2023-08-07 150327.png (55.74 KiB) Viewed 960 times

Then once I clicked 'ignore all' and ran the synch again, everything seemed OK?