[conman22]

Please HELP,

I have no disk space and no literacy with computers to fix it. I have a 66GB hard drive, but less than 1GB available. I hardly have any programs that didn't come with this thing (I deleted everything, but my iTunes and my personal files last time). This happened a few months ago as well. Feel free to check out my other post on the subject matter to get a more complete understanding. I've deleted my temp files, recycle bin, and even expanded my shadow storage capacity to 18GB and nothing has worked. Everytime I try to do a disk cleanup, I only get a few hundred KB...never more than 1GB. If anybody is willing to come to the rescue, I'd more than appreciate it. I need this computer to last until the summer I begin law school. Thanks for any help anybody is willing to provide.

Take care,
MC

[midders]

Download and run TreeSizeFree; this will show you which folders are taking up the majority of the space on your hard drive. It may just be that your music collection is too large and you need a larger or additional hard drive.

[conman22]

Midders,

Thanks for getting back to me. I have TreeSize Free running right now, albeit very slowly, but it's coming along. I will try and post a screenshot when it finishes so you can take a look if you'd like. Some of the stuff taking up my space I've never heard of. Once it finishes, though, how would I go about deleting some of the stuff, or even finding it to delete the program? I'm noticing as it's scanning that underneath Windows is a folder titled winsxs, which is taking up almost 10GB. That seems to be the biggest folder so far. Do I need that folder? If not, how do I delete it? Again, thanks for dropping by. I appreciate the help.

Flavallee,

I received an email stating that you replied to this thread as well, but can't come across your post. Could you re-post if possible? Thanks.

Thanks for the help so far. Hope we can clean this thing up,
MC

[flavallee]

I deleted it because I gave you instructions for XP and then realized you're using Vista.

----------------------------------------------------------------

[conman22]

Got it Flavallee...thanks for clarifying!

[conman22]

For whatever reason, TreeSize Free stopped (or at least hasn't continued scanning) at 30GB, but here are two screenshots that capture most of the data. Any advice on how to proceed from here and delete some of this stuff? Or any other suggestions to gain some more space? Thanks for the help.

Take care,
MC

[midders]

even expanded my shadow storage capacity to 18GB

Just picked up on this from your first post; what do you mean by this? If you mean you've changed windows virtual memory settings (paging file size) then this may be part of your problem. The windows paging file should never be more than double the size of the physical RAM that you have installed and often works well at a quarter of this size. If in any doubt let windows manage it automatically. The paging file takes up space on your hard drive, so the larger it is the less space you have for your files.

The fact that TreeSize stopped indicates that there may be a problem with your hard drive
- open windows explorer
- right-click on C: (the C drive)
- click Properties...
- click the Tools tab
- click Check now
- check the automatically fix... box and leave the surface scan box unchecked
- click Start
You should get a message saying something along the lines of disk check scheduled for next restart.
- restart the computer
When the check is complete, windows will start-up. Run TreeSize again and see if it completes.

[conman22]

I ran the disk scan as you suggested...it didn't quite finish (judging by the blue status bar, I'm estimating that it got up to 95% finished...but yesterday, it only got around 50%). However, it still says my C:\ is at 31.4GB, around the same as yesterday, but much lower (about half) than what is indicated when I click Start, Computer, C:\, Properties. It indicates 66GB, with only a few MB of free space. The attachments I attached yesterday is fairly similar than to the ones today after I restarted the CPU, so I won't redundantly re-post. Any ideas on how to best proceed from here?

As to your question, here is the link to the thread regarding the ShadowStorage. This is what I did a few months ago when I had the same problems.

http://forums.techguy.org/windows-vi...isk-space.html

I have since resized it down to 6GB on your logical reasoning that the larger it is, the less space the computer has for my other files.

Forgive me for my illiteracy, but anymore input would be appreciated.

Thanks Midders (or anybody else willing to chip in),
MC

[midders]

Please could you post your chkdsk log:
- right-click on My Computer
- click Manage
- click Event Viewer
- click Application
- double-click on Winlogon entry for the time that you did the disk check
- copy and paste the contents of the window

Forget about the shadow storage bit; it is to do with the volume shadow copy service and is used by backup software etc. that needs to copy files whilst they are being used by the operating system.

If the disk check is not completing then this could indicate a problem with your hard drive.

Slainte

midders

[conman22]

Is this what you were looking for? I noticed that their were a few of these done today, so I copied the most recent. Hope this helps. Let me know if this isn't what you're looking for and I'll re-post.

Thanks for the help,
MC

[midders]

No, should be eventid 1001 and look like this:

Checking file system on C:
The type of the file system is NTFS.
Volume label is System.


A disk check has been scheduled.
Windows will now check the disk.
Cleaning up minor inconsistencies on the drive.
Cleaning up 535 unused index entries from index $SII of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 535 unused index entries from index $SDH of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 535 unused security descriptors.
CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal...
Usn Journal verification completed.

10241405 KB total disk space.
4113528 KB in 18050 files.
5888 KB in 2770 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
140489 KB in use by the system.
53264 KB occupied by the log file.
5981500 KB available on disk.

4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
2560351 total allocation units on disk.
1495375 allocation units available on disk.

Internal Info:
b0 c1 00 00 60 51 00 00 04 6e 00 00 00 00 00 00 ....`Q...n......
54 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 bc 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 T...............
50 bd e6 00 00 00 00 00 90 fc d7 05 00 00 00 00 P...............
60 0a ec 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 `...............
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 90 3d 97 11 00 00 00 00 .........=......
99 9e 36 00 00 00 00 00 a0 39 07 00 82 46 00 00 ..6......9...F..
00 00 00 00 00 e0 11 fb 00 00 00 00 d2 0a 00 00 ................

Windows has finished checking your disk.
Please wait while your computer restarts.


For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

[TheOutcaste]

The chkdsk log in Vista/Win 7 now has a source of Wininit instead of Winlogon, same Event ID, 1001. It's in the screenshot, 11th item from the top.

You can click Action | Filter current log... and choose Wininit for the source to find it easily.

Couple of ways to copy:
Click the Copy link in the right pane (or Action | Copy) and choose Copy Details as Text
Click in the Text box on the General tab, press CTRL+A to highlight, press CTRL+C to copy.

Paste into the reply window or (Notepad) by clicking in the window and press CTRL+V, or right click and click Paste.

[conman22]

Checking file system on C:
The type of the file system is NTFS.
Volume label is ACER.

A disk check has been scheduled.
Windows will now check the disk.
1467776 file records processed. 1263 large file records processed. 0 bad file records processed. 0 EA records processed. 44 reparse records processed. 1508262 index entries processed. 0 unindexed files processed. 1467776 security descriptors processed. Cleaning up 3321 unused index entries from index $SII of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 3321 unused index entries from index $SDH of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 3321 unused security descriptors.
20244 data files processed. CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal...
37199424 USN bytes processed. Usn Journal verification completed.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the
master file table (MFT) bitmap.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the volume bitmap.
Windows has made corrections to the file system.
69964331 KB total disk space.
67755960 KB in 1446204 files.
605252 KB in 20245 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
1566215 KB in use by the system.
50000 KB occupied by the log file.
36904 KB available on disk.
4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
17491082 total allocation units on disk.
9226 allocation units available on disk.
Internal Info:
80 65 16 00 5c 60 16 00 a5 4e 2c 00 00 00 00 00 .e..\`...N,.....
76 08 00 00 2c 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 v...,...........
42 00 00 00 1f 86 64 77 38 e5 1f 00 38 dd 1f 00 B.....dw8...8...
Windows has finished checking your disk.
Please wait while your computer restarts.

[conman22]

I think I got it this time. Is the above post what you are looking for? Thanks for taking a look. Any feedback would be appreciated.

TheOutcaste, thanks for joining the discussion. I appreciate you taking a look as well.

Look forward to hearing back from yall,
MC

[Mollie]

Sometimes the files for System Restore take up a LOT of space. To reclaim that space, go to control panel, then system, then click on system protection, then on the tab "system protection" UNcheck any boxes that are checked-marked. Click "apply," then "ok," then close all windows and reboot. When you log back on, check to see if it gave you back any disk space. If it did, you can re-enable System Restore. Just don't forget to clean it out every once in a while!

Good luck!

Mollie