Harddrive Space Vanishing!

hi every day i get on my xps m1530 and i check the harddrive space and each day i seem to lose about 5 gigs of space... im not pleased with this... does anybody know what might be taking up space? ive only had the laptop for about two weeks now. im wondering if it might be backing up data in another place, if so how do i disable this?

 

check disk cleanup, hibernation space....

 

System restore I'd say, that and superfetch, indexing and other vista features.
It would have thought it'd have stopped by now though...

If you have plenty of ram you could disable the pagefile...

 

You have a program that is running in the background that is probably making temp files or generating a file of constantly expanding proportions.

It could be also caused by malware that is trying to do this. Open up your task manager and startup options by typing msconfig in the search bar of Vista and uncheck any processes that look suspicious and out of place.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=270634
The rest probably went for Hibernation. Just clean them up using Disk Cleanup.

 

I'm pretty computer illiterate. So could someone tell me two things: if the amount of os left is normal.It says 228 gb out of 285 gb. i've only added my printer,two documents and snood to my computer. And second, what the recover disk is and if only have 20% left would be normal.

My computer is less than a month old... I have a 4 gig hd.

thanks

 

What disk space is normal?

Recover disk is a disk. Its not a part of your hard drive. Newer dell models have a recovery "section" on the hard drive to restore to factory condition.

20% left of what? Normal huh? What what huh?

It would help if you specified what 20% refers to, how much disk space you took up, and most of all, ask your questions properly.

 

60GB is a tad much for OS (i use up 30GB after installing tons of crap)


how are you getting the figure 285?

 

SYSTEM RESTORE I'd say

Disable System Restore

Computer > Properties > System Protection > 'Uncheck' all the drives.

Click OK

You must have regained all the lost space

 

Ok, so you edited your post. As to your editing:

You should have much more space than 228GB as the operating system Windows Vista, should take no more than 10GB with its backup partitions. Printer, two documents, really arn't space takers either.

Its not the amount of OS left is normal, it is the amount of disk space left is normal on your hard drive. OS is just Windows. Its part of what takes up space.

The above also doesn't make sense still with:

How can it say 228 out of 285 when you have a 4 gig hd?

If you had reformatted and you are getting this amount of disk space left, open up My Computer and look and see if you have two partitions (aka. C drive and say a D drive). Add up the total disk space and add up the space used as it might just be because its split up.

If thats not the case, then most likely you had repartitioned your drive in the wrong way. Open up Disk Management in Windows Vista (if thats the OS you run) and you can resize your partition to take advantage of all the extra space.

There also may be the chance that there is a separate partition that is just unused and is simply taking up space, if so, then remove it. If you are not sure, post what you see in Disk Management (what drives, partitions, space available, space used) and someone will help you out.

Make sure your recycling bin in emptied. If all that is not the case... then use Disk Cleanup and use it to free up a bunch of space and if that still doesn't give you enough... then clear system restores, though it shouldnt be the problem.

The hidden recovery partition is only 500 mbs, so it should not make any major difference. It is something else.

Your welcome.

 

system restore(vss) will be 15%, so of 285gb thats 42gb
hibernation at least 4gb
page file at least 3gb

so thats 50gb - it all looks normal to me.

The vss usage will increase slowly until all 15% is used which is when it starts deleting the older shadow copies. From your figures there is a chance the 15% is not yet reached, you might lose another 5-10gb.

You can check how much is used by vss by doing the following:

right click on command prompt (in the all programs list under accessories) and run as administrator

type: vssadmin list shadowstorage

 

Probably your snood that's the problem.

 

Thanks for your help

 

I got a new DELL INSP1548 T5800 during first week of January this year..



I only run music and stuff off of my external hard drive. I was wondering if anyone would be kind enough to explain to me where the hell the memory is going to.

Im such an amateur at best of times with this.. so simplified replies would be appreciated. Cheers.

 

Did you not read the thread?
Dump your System Restore Checkpoints and then come back.
Easiest way to do this without turning it off (it's worth having turned on as it can occasionally be an easy way of getting out of trouble) is to right click on your C: partition, properties, Disk Cleanup button, let it calculate, then hit the "More Options" tab, clean up button under "System Restore and Shadow Copies" and delete all but the last system checkpoint.

You can also change the amount of diskspace used by System Restore by right-clicking "My Computer", Properties, "System Protection" under Tasks on the left and make your changes.

 

anyways, yeah the system restore points have always gotten large amounts of space from my HD, thats why i just like to disable it and save myself from all those issues...

 

An old, but applicable, guide: Where's All My Disk Space Going? (Vista)