I 'fresh-installed' Vista yesterday in a 36GB partition. After installing SP1 and SP2 and more than 200 Windows updates, a couple of spyware removal and AVG anti virus, Adobe reader, VLC, Firefox and Chrome, the remaining free space now is only 10GB. The Program Files folder is 4GB while the Windows folder is 16GB. Page file is 1.7GB and hiberfil is around 1GB. System Restore says it will use up to 15% of the partition. I already deleted all TEMP files that I can find. I suspect there is something in the Windows folder that keeps on increasing in size. Very fast. I wonder if there is anything in it that can be safely deleted or at least set a limit on its size. Thanks.
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You can disable hibernation and reclaim the space from hiberfil.sys
Use Treesize free to find out which folders/files are using all your space.
http://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/ -
First off, a 36GB partition is way too small for an OS like Vista, IMO. It normally eats up alotof HDD space. Vista is a HDD hog for space. I can't imagine a boot partition smaller than 80GB with any newer Windows OS. That's if you want to keep running the OS for a while without changes. 120GB is better.
What is probably increasing in size is Vista itself. Hiberfil seems a bit small at 1GB. I suspect it increases. I would check the page file also. It probably also increased in size.
You may be stuck with the HDDs you have, but if you can, get away from Vista. W7 has a smaller footprint. But you really need more HDD space, especially for the OS. -
I 'fresh-installed' Vista yesterday in a 36GB partition. After installing SP1 and SP2 and more than 200 Windows updates, a couple of spyware removal and AVG anti virus, Adobe reader, VLC, Firefox and Chrome, the remaining free space now is only 10GB.
I had used some folder/file size (free) utility to monitor which folder and which file(s) were eating up most of the space. That gave me clue to uninstall a particular software. I was fortunate that time I had paid version of Kaspersky.
Plus other members already suggested to delete (and limit size) hybernate.sys file, you should also empty temp folders too.
The Program Files folder is 4GB while the Windows folder is 16GB. -
Windows has a number of hidden folders that will grow over time, System Volume Information, Recovery, Recycler, ProgramData, Installer... You can set Explorer to show them. You can prevent some from growing by turning off some features like System Restore or just empty the garbage can.
There's a Disk Cleanup tool in Start>Accessories>System Tools that will do a lot of the work for you and it can also remove stuff in places you can't.
After that you can run Ccleaner to get more free space. It even has a tool that will let you select restore points to delete so you can keep System Restore active and not lose too much space.
Windows will let you set how much space to use for things like Recycler, Restore..., just go through the Control Panel (use large icon view). Hiberfil.sys contains a copy of the contents of the RAM no more i.e. it will always be the same size as the amount of RAM in the PC.
And defrag once in a while doesn't hurt.Last edited by nic2k4; 10th Jun 2014 at 11:28.
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When using the Disk Cleanup tool remember to go to the More Options tab and clean up System Restore and Shadow Copies (make sure the system is stable first).
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Thanks, guys.
I ran Tree Size and it shows winsxs as 8.5GB and System Volume Info as 4.5GB.
I will give this to my nephew in the Philippines with the Recovery disc. Perhaps, if this laptop is used only for Facebook and the likes, hard drive space use would not be concern. Windows updates may pose a problem though.