progression

Some of Windows Vista’s “Enhancements” have made the operating system rely heavily on valuable hard disk space.  Recently I’ve been trying to comprehend how I could have possibly filled up a 750 gb hard drive with 680 gb of information after only owning the computer for 6 months.  The fact of the matter is that a few of these “enhancements” use way more than they need in order to “enhance” your user experience.

There are two Windows Vista Specific features that hinder disk space:

1. Windows “Temp” folder (Used for IE7 and applications that use the Windows Installer API for installation)
2. Windows “Shadow Copy” service (Used to create periodic system restore points to prevent data loss due to malicious software or hardware failure)

You can save yourself upwards of 5 GB of space if you periodically empty your “TEMP” folder, however the real disk space hog lies in the latter “enhancement.”

The Windows Shadow Copy service can use up to 15% of your hard disk space just by keeping ancient versions of your files.  The problem lies in that the Windows Shadow Copy service creates copies of your files DAILY by default.  From what i’ve seen this “vault” of backups purges backups that are a month old or older.

By deleting the Windows Shadow Copy backups (not including the most recent one) I was able to free up 120 gb of space on my 750 GB hard drive (16%).

Thankfully, Windows Vista provides us with an age old tool to nuke worthless, decaying files: Disk Cleanup.  Originally I was skeptical that this utility would be useful (due to the ever-so-hated “Desktop Cleanup” on XP), however it seems to get the job done well.

• Start by opening up “Disk Cleanup” in “System Tools” under “Accessories” on the start menu.  From there, select “C:\” to scan that drive for files to clean.

• Once the Cleanup utility has actually opened, here you can check off other things you would like to cleanup like the Windows Temp Folder.  Mine had 4 GB of information in it.  You can also trash the Hibernate information if you prefer to use the sleep feature instead. (No they are not the same thing.)

• So just go ahead and check off whatever you don’t want, then move on to the “More options” tab and under “System Restore and Shadow Copies” click “Cleanup.”

• Next, a confirmation window will appear, asking you to delete all but your most recent restore points.  Click “Delete”

• At this point you may think: “AHH MY COMPUTERS FROZEN!” But no worries, Windows is handling a lot of information right now and is currently deleting a lot of information. To check and make sure your Disk Cleanup application is still functioning, open up “My Computer” and see if your C:\’s free space is increasing by right clicking and hitting “Refresh” periodically.

This should give you plenty of disk space back.