Why suddenly DOS-type hexadecimal file names?

Posted by Marvin Nicholson on Super User See other posts from Super User or by Marvin Nicholson
Published on 2013-11-02T03:53:27Z Indexed on 2013/11/02 3:58 UTC
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Filed under:

windows-xp

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hard-drive

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sata

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filenames

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hexadecimal

One of the fairly recent folders on my XP SATA data drive suddenly shows DOS-type hexadecimal file names (i.e., eight characters with three-character extensions) I deleted them and now my Recycle bin shows them with a tilde (i.e., 194ABE~1.JPG). The images are all valid but the file names I assigned are gone. (The 2-terabyte SATA data drive has no OS, if that matters.)

The last time this happened on an IDE drive, I was able to back up all the remaining files just before the drive died. Am I facing the same scenario now with my 2-terabyte SATA data drive? It is only a couple of years old. Should I quickly buy another one and back up 20 years of files to it before my current drive dies?

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