Comp question

[partypooper]

A dumb question, when I click on System C, it shows that I have 608 MB of free space, and that there is a total of 9.76GB. But when I look what's on there (apart from Windows) it's all in lots of about 10-12 MB and not that much of it, I can't see how it would add up to more than 9GB???

[Chrome Prince]

Partypooper,
I'm assuming it's a 10GB drive from your info.
If you have 608MB of free space, that's going to cause problems.
Ideally you should have half the drive free, or at least a third.

You can't see hidden files and folders, so that's going to take up room.
Windows will take up room
Pagefile - your computer writes temporary memory information to this file and unless you clean it or tweak it, it's just going to get bigger and bigger.
MFT - master file table is allocated space for windows to boot up.
System Restore - there might be too many snapshots held on your drive.

If you really don't have very much on the drive, and it's this full, you probably need to clean it.

CCleaner from FileHippo.com is safe to use - beware of many others, they can cause problems.

Also right click drive C:
Select Properties and then disk cleanup
(it will probably take quite some time for a dialogue box to come up if you haven't done this in a while)
Finally, a dialogue box will pop up with check boxes, make sure all are checked.
Select the More Options" tab
Under System Restore only click cleanup.
Hit Yes when it asks are you sure?

When it's finished hit o.k.

Finally defragment your drive.

Have a look at the space now.

It might take a really long time to perform some actions, be patient and don't think it's frozen, if you haven't done this in a while it could take up to an hour to complete. It should only take seconds on a regularly maintained computer ;)

[partypooper]

Thanks Chrome, I tried to follow your promts therer but couldn't quite. i.e. R/click on c> R/click on properties > gives me the cake showing the Blue (used) and pink free, and option for clean up clicked that and got the ticked boxes page with a more options thingo at the top, this gives me 3 options, (1) Create more space by removing unused windows components etc, (2) create more space by removing unused programmes, and (3) System restore, .. clicked on that, and questions "are you sure that you want to remove all but the latest restore info , clicked yes and got about another 200 MB , better than nothing but I'm sure youre right its full of crap. I used the CC cleaner already but not much diff. any other way to check?

PS One of the cake options is to compress files, this is unticked at the mo, maybe this is the problem??

[Chrome Prince]

Thanks Chrome, I tried to follow your promts therer but couldn't quite. i.e. R/click on c> R/click on properties > gives me the cake showing the Blue (used) and pink free, and option for clean up clicked that and got the ticked boxes page with a more options thingo at the top, this gives me 3 options, (1) Create more space by removing unused windows components etc, (2) create more space by removing unused programmes, and (3) System restore, .. clicked on that, and questions "are you sure that you want to remove all but the latest restore info , clicked yes and got about another 200 MB , better than nothing but I'm sure youre right its full of crap. I used the CC cleaner already but not much diff. any other way to check?

PS One of the cake options is to compress files, this is unticked at the mo, maybe this is the problem??

Did you make sure all boxes were ticked on the first page before going to more options?
You can also try the time limited demo of tune up utilities.

This version is easiest to use:

http://www.tune-up.com/download/tu2006/

After installing do the clean up and repair.
Tuneup disk cleaner AND tuneup registry cleaner.
Do the registry cleaner a couple of times.

I really think you need either a bigger drive or add a second drive.

10GB is very small these days.

In the days of Win98 you could get away with it, but XP is full of so much bloatware, you really need a minimum of 20GB to get by.

P.S. No don't compress files - it will take hours and you won't see much benefit, you risk corruption and you'll not have authority to compress some system files anyway.

[partypooper]

Ran the Tune up thingo Chrome and recovered about 30MB, so a bit better but I still can't see how there is 9GB+ on there?? anyway thanks for your help, I'm holding off buying a new machine as I might be taking over my sons' (he was in IT) and had the latest stuff with 3 screens etc etc . cheers!

[crash]

Party,

Both these will repartition your C drive to a larger size without disturbing anything on them.


Partition Magic [costs money]

Gparted [free]
Still does a good job and relatively easy to use but an Open Source Tool - GParted is just as graphical, nearly as easy to use, possibly a little faster (subjective judgment only), comes in Live CD and USB Versions and best of all it's free :) You do need a decent download speed to download this onto disc.

http://gparted.sourceforge.net/

[jayjones1]

id have to go partition magic http://c08y1024qmyi129.imageshacknow.info/img/744/k08w1114mkfo/biggrin.gifhttp://c08y1024qmyi129.imageshacknow.info/img/1808/k08w1114mkfo/biggrin.gifhttp://c08y1024qmyi129.imageshacknow.info/img/1795/k08w1114mkfo/biggrin.gifhttp://c08y1024qmyi129.imageshacknow.info/img/1981/k08w1114mkfo/biggrin.gif

[crash]

Partition magic can be downloaded free, which shows you what you can do with it. However I don't think it does anything unless you buy it. If your not confident go the easy way.

My solution would be to disk anything you want to keep and do a clean install of windows. Delete all partitions and create a new C and D. I only use an 80g hard drive and I have 30g for the OS [C] and 50g[D] for data storage ect.
It's easy to do and if you don't know how then google it.

Unless your into downloading movies or heaps of music, anything more than a 100g HD is a waste of time as nobody has data enough for anything bigger and defraging these new giant HD's is a pain [unless you have 'Executive software Diskeeper', a separate defrag. [not free] that does the job quick smart and even defrags. the paging file. I use it even for my small HD. It takes seconds.

[partypooper]

Crash (guys) only just spotted these posts, thanks heaps will have a gander, but as my skills are limited might get back to this area b4 I do anything.