Windows 10 1809 update deleted all files from Documents!

Anonymous
2018-10-04T19:09:32+00:00

Last night I updated to 1809, and it all went smoothly, but then I find that all my files in Documents are DELETED. Gone. Poof. This included many crucial documents and financial info. Yes, I have a backup (I think - using Windows Backup to a NAS). But this is pretty bad. Did no one in the first two rings run into this yet?

I understand (from the news) that this happens to all files in Documents that aren't synced to OneDrive. Further, the Documents folder is really an agglomeration of "Documents" from several different paths - not sure how that works, and it may or may not relate.

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Windows update

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  1. Anonymous
    2018-10-08T19:41:50+00:00

    I doubt it's a ploy to move to OneDrive, we had a user lose all of her OneDrive files and they are no longer in the cloud, recycle bin or 2nd stage recycle bin. This is mind boggling!

    Backup strategies aside (none of which are completely ideal for this situation), I've since moved - lock stock and barrel - my "My Pictures," "My Music," and "My Videos" folders to my Dropbox and synced them across all my PCs, and moved all my links/documents that I would normally keep on my various desktops (I use Dexpot for multiple virtual desktops) to my secondary hard drive; I'm working on moving my documents OUT OF "My Documents" and into a Documents folder on the secondary drive, which will then be moved and synced to Dropbox as well on all machines... Windows at least doesn't have any permissions in place to hose THOSE locations anymore.

    Since I apparently can't trust my OS provider to not try to actively sabotage my computers, I have to be proactive about changing organizational habits developed over 20 years of using Windows.

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  2. Anonymous
    2018-10-08T18:49:35+00:00

    I doubt it's a ploy to move to OneDrive, we had a user lose all of her OneDrive files and they are no longer in the cloud, recycle bin or 2nd stage recycle bin. This is mind boggling!

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  3. Anonymous
    2018-10-08T17:23:04+00:00

    It's all backed out but it was just the shock of seeing the files empty. Fine now, thank you.

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  4. Anonymous
    2018-10-08T16:06:58+00:00

    Thank you

    I am done

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  5. Neil D 34,280 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2018-10-08T15:12:20+00:00

    If you close Office and select Start > Power > Restart, to restart the device does it still give the same error. Are you able to view your files in OneDrive using the same account.

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