Why do I have a folder 4_1 on my main Hard Drive

Question

Why do I have a folder 4_1 on my main Hard Drive

The past couple of weeks I suddenly notice a folder on my main window when I open my main Hard Drive. It is a standard folder labeled 4_1 with nothing in the folder!

What is this? Why is it appearing? I believe it must be somehow related to an application I am using--- but which one and why? Not a virus is it?

Very strange--- any comments welcome!

Best regards,

Steve Schulte

Sunday 10 March 2013

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion, Also a Mac SE running 6.0.4 - not upgrading that!

Posted on Mar 10, 2013 3:33 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Barney-15E

Level 10

112,530 points

Mar 10, 2013 4:06 PM in response to Stephen Schulte1

Not sure what that is. You are probably correct that it is being created by something you are using, but I don't know what that would be.

Try opening terminal and typing

ls -al

leaving a space after the al, (don't hit return, yet), then drag the folder to Terminal and drop. Hit return.

Essentially, you'll get this as the command:

ls -al /4_1

If there is anything hidden in the folder, it will be displayed in the terminal. The first line will be the folder itself, ending in a .

The second line is the enclosing foler, ending in . .

Then, it will list the contents of the folder.

Reply

Answer 2

Mar 11, 2013 1:07 AM in response to Barney-15E

Barney-15E,

Thanks for your fast and fine reply!! I'm learning a lot this weekend with the installation of my new SSD drive and now this Terminal Talk!

Here's the result (note that I had dropped the file into a folder which I have on my desktop that I call my "TRASH HOLD" folder for files that I don't want to trash just yet.

SteveSchulteMBP13:~ scschulte$ ls -al /Users/scschulte/Desktop/TRASH\ HOLD/4_1

total 0

drwxr-xr-x 2 scschulte wheel 68 Mar 10 14:43 .

drwxrwxrwx@ 8 root wheel 272 Mar 10 23:33 ..

Not sure what this means-- any interpretation appreciated!

Thanks again,

Best regards,

Steve Schulte

Monday 11 March 2013

Reply

Answer 3

Barney-15E

Level 10

112,530 points

Mar 11, 2013 4:44 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

It means there is nothing in the folder, hidden or visible.

It is owned by you, so whatever created it was operating under your login.

Reply

Answer 4

Mar 13, 2013 3:34 AM in response to Barney-15E

This folder again appeared this morning on my hard drive. I am trying to think what programs I have installed recently or what programs that I haven't used in a while that I started to use again.

He does not seem to be harmful but I certainly find it a mystery.

If anyone has ever had any experience with strange folders appearing on their hard drive I'd love to hear about it – trying to get to the bottom of this issue.

Best regards,

Steve

13 March 2013

Reply

Answer 5

Imp68

Level 4

2,672 points

Mar 13, 2013 3:49 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

Could it be Network Magic or something called 4shared? Try a spotlight search if you aren't sure.

Reply

Answer 6

Mar 13, 2013 4:08 AM in response to Imp68

Thanks for your reply but a search with both Spotlight and Easyfind turn up nothing.

This is a mystery I have to solve!

Steve

Reply

Answer 7

Imp68

Level 4

2,672 points

Mar 13, 2013 7:41 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

Does it show up in Safe Mode? Boot with Shift held.

Have a look at your login items and see if anything rings a bell. Apple >> system preferences >> Users and Groups >> Login Items (upper right).

Reply

Answer 8

Mar 13, 2013 11:29 AM in response to Imp68

It sometimes does not show up for days at a time. So boarding for two days into safe mode is not an option for me. I will look at start up items and other things and post back here in a day or two. Thanks very much.

Reply

Answer 9

Mar 13, 2013 11:30 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

Sorry that was booting or starting up in safe mode not boarding. I get too confident with the dictation on this iPad but it's not perfect I really need to check each time.

Reply

Answer 10

Patty1

Level 1

123 points

Mar 19, 2013 11:22 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

Stephen, I found an empty folder by that name at the top level of my iMac's hard drive last night and went Googling to see whether anyone had information about it. The only info I found was this thread.

But...I went back in my Firefox history and discovered that the creation time on the folder was right around the time I installed a trial version of Wondershare AllMyTube. By any chance have you recently installed that or some other Wondershare product? I've now removed that trial software and the folder; so far today, no further sign of the folder.

Reply

Answer 11

Mar 20, 2013 1:24 AM in response to Patty1

Absolutely Brilliant! Yes brilliant!!! 🙂🙂 What a great piece of computer detective work! Amazing and exactly my case-- I must have trashed 15 files with wondershare in them--- think I had trashed the program itself months ago--- but should have used CleanMyMac2 or something to really eliminate everything.

I'm calling this SOLVED but will open a new post if this comes back in the next week but believe it truly is solved!!

SUPER and thanks so very much!!!

Just great--- I owe you a dinner in Bruxelles!! 😀

Made my day!!!!!!!!!!!

Best regards,

Steve

Wednesday 20 March 2013

Reply

Answer 12

Mar 20, 2013 4:46 AM in response to Patty1

NOT SOLVED! 😢 (but close…) 😉

Well very close now and thanks to you! It seems the program "Free Video Downloader 4.1.0" (also called iSkySoft Free Video Downloader for Mac) is causing this. I open this handy program to download a YouTube from the www and then a few minutes or hours later the folder 4_1 appears on my main HD. (See attached- background blue because my HD window background is blue…)

I have written to the company iSkySoft and let's see--- they have been responsive in the past.

I wish to thank you again for discovering this-- it was driving me crazy!

Best regards,

Steve Schulte

Wednesday 20 March 2013

Reply

Answer 13

Patty1

Level 1

123 points

Mar 20, 2013 10:08 AM in response to Stephen Schulte1

That's interesting, Stephen. I see from the Wondershare website that their AllMyTube product is also on version 4.1.0, so is it possible that you and I ended up with the same folder because of different programs??

Too bad your situation wasn't solved with my idea about AllMyTube. I was just about to book a flight to lovely Bruxelles for that dinner. :-)

Patty

Reply

Answer 14

Mar 20, 2013 10:51 AM in response to Patty1

Wait that dinner invite is still on!!

And I think this is all related anyway… can't just be a coincidence this 4_1 folder thing… This is likely a let's-have-fun-conspiracy by the WondershareiSkySoftAllMyTubeFreeVideoRecorder mafioso… In any case it will make for a thrilling, exhilarating, action-packed, stirring, rousing, stimulating, intoxicating, electrifying, invigorating, gripping, compelling, powerful and dramatic non-stop dinner conversation. …or maybe not… but the 450 dramatically different Belgian beers certainly will!

I have written to the iSkySoft people and shall get to the bottom (or top) of this soon… In the meantime I may have to go back to my Mac SE running OS 6.0.4 which does not have this problem…

Steve

Wednesday 20 March 2013

actually snowing in Belgium today…

Reply

Answer 15

Mar 21, 2013 4:55 AM in response to Patty1

Reply from iSkySoft:

Dear Stephen ,

Thanks for contacting iSkysoft! This is Sharon from the Support Team. I'm here to help.

I'm so sorry for the inconvenience caused. We have reproduced the case and it will be solved in the next upgrade. Would you please kindly wait for the upgrade?

OK I have no choice but to wait!

Seems positive---- if it's not an iSkySoft Trojan Horse outfit… (think not…)

Steve

Thursday 21 March 2013

Reply